The Bucketlist
by SantoNaranja
Summary: Two women; two lists; one goal. Maura wants to do things she has never done before. Jane suggests a bucket list. As they strive to complete their lists, they might unexpectedly learn a thing or two along the way.
1. Prologue

I'm back! Couple of things. First, follow me on twitter santonaranja Secondly, there is an 8tracks playlist which goes with this fic and can be found linked in my twitter. Thirdly, the majority of this fic was written before the show decided to go canon with a bucketlist plot but I'm not bitter... And lastly, this takes place at the beginning of season 2, after the premiere. Enjoy!

* * *

Jane shuts the door behind her and slumps back against it. She closes her eyes and wrings her hands by her sides. Breathing out through her nose, she lets the tension ease and drain away from her body.

The drive home was so long she thought that she would never make it home. She should have expected the traffic to be so bad. Yet it completely slipped her mind until she was sitting behind the wheel of her car. A train of cars in front and behind. Packing her in.

"Jane? Is that you?" a bright voice calls from out of sight.

Jane's eyes open and a tired smile dawns on her face. She rounds the corner to the kitchen to see Maura. The doctor is chopping an onion into fine pieces on the wooden board.

The M.E.'s eyes light up when she raises her head to see Jane taking a seat at the island. She frowns when she registers the fatigue on the detective's face.

"Oh Jane, did you get held up?" Maura asks, using the knife to dice the onion further into smaller, neater chunks.

"Like you wouldn't believe. Got stuck with another false lead that went nowhere," Jane grumbles. The sides of her mouth turn down. She remembers that particular pill of bitter disappointment.

It had become a familiar taste today.

"Traffic?"

"Terrible."

"Ah, just as I thought," Maura muses, setting her knife down and turning away. "I have just what you need."

Jane doesn't even realise what her friend refers to until a bottle of beer appears. She wraps her hands around the bottle and groans to find it so chilled. From the first sip, she savours the cold drops sliding down her throat. They soothe the irritation of the day away.

The knife picks up on the chopping board again. Jane grins at Maura. The honey blonde smiles at Jane's reaction while still concentrating on cutting with precision.

"Thanks, Maur," Jane says.

Maura doesn't answer, she just beams. Finishing the onions, she lifts up the board. Scraping them into the heated pan, they sizzle with the contact. The smell which arises is immediate and intoxicating.

Jane rests her head on her hand, her elbow on the granite island-top. She stifles a yawn as they maintain a content and companionable silence. And then she stifles another, but only barely.

Maura glimpses over her shoulder as she washes the chopping board in the sink. "Tired?"

"Oh so very tired," Jane replies sarcastically.

When Maura turns, her eyes shimmer with hardly suppressed humour. "Oh so very tired? Yes, because I can imagine how sitting in traffic is physically exhausting," she says. A wink and a sly smile is thrown Jane's way before she returns the board to its correct shelving.

The detective's eyebrows shoot upwards at the remark, and she bursts out laughing. But her mirth is cut short when her scar tissue screams its protest. A hiss escapes her as she gingerly palms her side. It makes Maura frown in concern and pause what she is doing.

"Your side is still giving you grief?" Maura asks. She deftly makes her way around the island, putting a comforting hand on her friend's shoulder. Jane groans, shaking her head but not making any effort to shrug Maura off.

"I'm fine. It just flares up sometimes is all," she mumbles. Maura hovers unconvinced. Jane rolls her eyes and takes another hearty swig from the bottle in her hand.

"Jane, if it's bothering you-"

"Maura, leave it will ya," Jane snaps. She immediately wishes she could take the words back when Maura retracts her hand. Like Jane has clicked a lighter and brought it up to sear into her palm. Maura looks wounded; Jane's heart deflates.

"No, no. I'm sorry- I just..." Jane sighs, closing her eyes and rubbing her forehead. The caring, healing touch returns. A warm hand on her shoulder once more.

"I know, Jane. It's difficult, and you don't like to talk about it." Maura adds as an afterthought, "I'm sorry for pushing you." She moves to the other side of the island.

Jane grips her bottle. She watches Maura retreat back around to lose herself in the task of preparing their dinner. Maura had no need to apologise and yet she did. As if something was her fault. Like she did something wrong. Jane wonders if this is something that Maura has thought and done a lot in her life. It makes her ache inside. As if she is being hollowed out and filled with space.

Nothingness.

"Anyway," Jane segues, full of false bravado. "We have to avoid Ma for at least the next month and a half."

The doctor's eyebrows knit together in confusion. She retrieves the butter from the fridge. "What? Why?"

"Because," Jane explains. She leans a little further forward and lowers her voice as if her mother was lurking out of sight. Ready to pounce at the topic of conversation. "It'll soon be my birthday."

Maura puts her thumb into her mouth, cleaning off a stray sliver of butter. She hums and tilts her head. Jane knows Maura has had plenty of experience with Angela Rizzoli. She understands how heavily invested Jane's mother can get in her children's lives. Especially Jane's. She definitely kicks up at gear when it approaches one of their birthdays.

"What do you propose that we should do to avoid her for that period of time?" Maura asks, returning the butter to the fridge and reaching for the red peppers.

Jane watches Maura wash the vegetables as she considers the question for a second. "Hide in an underground bunker for a while? Stock up on supplies, hook up ESPN. It'll be great!"

Maura cuts the first pepper down the centre. She stops and meets Jane's eye as the knife clicks against the chopping board. Jane grins sheepishly and shrugs. It makes laughter bubble up from Maura's throat as she resumes dicing the peppers.

"What?" Jane protests, holding out her arms in indignation. Even when her shoulders shake with laughter. "It's a great idea!"

"It's a terrible idea and you know it," Maura admonishes. She throws the sliced red peppers into the pan. They scatter amongst the onions.

"Ah, good enough," Jane replies. The smell in the kitchen is beginning to overwhelm her now. The low grumbling of her stomach makes her aware of just how long ago her lunch hour was.

Maura takes care to check the timer for the chicken breasts in the oven. She has an unreadable expression on her face. "Most of the time you act as if you're being suffocated. But being suffocated seems a lot more pleasant than nothing at all."

And then nothing more than the sizzling of the cooking.

Jane feels that the silence is smothering all a sudden. She wonders where on earth that response came from. She looks to Maura to try and understand why the kitchen now crackles with tension. The doctor stands there with her fingertips resting on the pan handle. Unmoving and unblinking, locked away in a different world.

"Maura," Jane coaxes, ducking her head to try and catch her best friend's eye. The side of her lips turn down in concern as Maura snaps out of her thoughts, pain marring her face. "Where did you go just now?"

"It's...it's nothing," Maura tries, her voice breaking before she can clear it.

Undeterred, Jane sits up straighter. But Maura shakes her head, leaning her palms on the island-top.

"I was just thinking about my mother and how she never..." Maura pinches the bridge of her nose and heaves a deep, shuddering sigh. "You're so fortunate, Jane. And I know I have no right to even..." She waves her hand and turns away once more.

"Aw Maura. No, come on," Jane hops off of her stool and stands. She circles the island and wraps Maura up into her arms. The doctor resists at first. Then she goes slack, and finally melts into the detective's embrace. Maura slips her arms around Jane's waist, pulling her closer.

Jane places a kiss on the crown of soft golden hair. To convey some sense of calm and confidence. She ignores how her chest seems to expand and ignite with emotions she can't quite put a name to. She strokes Maura's back.

"Okay?" she whispers after a while.

Maura nods against Jane's shoulder. When they break apart, Maura's eyes have remained dry. The distress that had darkened her features has gone away. Jane is encouraged, winking at Maura before returning to the stool opposite her.

Later, the small talk has exhausted them both. They are more than content just to sate their appetites.

"Jane?" Maura prompts, the name out of her mouth before her question is full evolved.

"Uh-huh," Jane manages between shovelling a forkful of chicken into her mouth.

Maura takes a deep breath, glancing down at her almost empty plate. She can't quite keep eye contact. Concerned, Jane swallows and lowers her cutlery to her plate. She wipes her mouth with her napkin and refocuses on her best friend.

Maura's shoulders slump, tense up, and then slump again. It is a key sign that she is trying to work through frustration to try and voice an opinion. Jane's heart clenches at her friend's nervousness to voice her thoughts.

Like they wouldn't be good enough for her.

Like Jane was going to laugh at her like all the others have before.

"Maura," Jane utters, reaching across the table and gently squeezing the doctor's hand. "Whatever you wanna say, say it."

Maura's eye twitches, and she sits up straighter.

"Have you ever wondered what life would be like if we took a chance once in a while and did something special?" Maura rushes, muscles tensing as she waits for Jane's reply.

The detective's jaw goes slack, and she licks her lips. A sudden gush of adrenaline overcomes Maura and the rest of her idea comes pouring out. "What if we lived our lives through concentrating on the small rewards in life? Would we be more or less accomplished than we are now?"

Jane's eyes widen and she has to clear her throat before she is able to speak. "Uh...beer good. Food smells good. Traffic _bad_."

Maura finally meets Jane's eye once more. She smiles brightly, shaking her head at the lacklustre response. "I'm serious. I was thinking about your birthday and I was just thinking that...there are so many little things we could do. We live in a very historical city, Jane. How many famous places or landmarks can you say you've actually been to in all of the years that you've lived in Boston?"

Jane's eyebrows scrunch together in an attempt to catch Maura's meaning. "So you're saying we're gonna go on one of those bus tour things? Count me out, Maur, they always make you wear stupid I Heart Boston T-shirts like it's frickin' NYC." The brunette vehemently shakes her head, brown locks dancing. "No. No way."

Maura rolls her eyes and tilts her head. "No, Jane." She sighs, uncertain of how exactly to phrase what she wants to say. "What I'm trying to say is that imagine we didn't get so caught up in the daily thrust of life. Imagine we lived for the smaller, finer moments. Doing something kind for a stranger, trying something new for a change. Something different that pushes the limits of our comfort zones."

Jane narrows her eyes, and then clicks her fingers. "Like a bucket list?"

Maura taps a fingertip to her lips. "Yes, I suppose so."

Jane tosses this idea around in her head for a second. She leans forward, unable to deny the spark of curiosity and interest inside. "So, what? You wanna make a bucket list?" she clarifies.

Maura licks her lips, the question stagnant in her mind for a moment before she sharply nods. "Yes."

Jane narrows her eyes, scrutinising her friend for her level of seriousness. She finds no flaw or joking tease; the detective finds her completely honest. Taking a viciously deep gulp of her beer, Jane looks away from the intensity of waiting hazel eyes.

The beer bottle clicks against the island as she sets it down. Seconds of silence slip by them, around them, but Jane's mind is far from silent. It's a din; a symphony. But none of the notes match or harmonise and instead of music it's just white noise. Blaring white noise.

And then her mind goes still. She meets Maura's eyes, glimmering in the bright kitchen lights.

"Okay, but I kinda wanna make one too," Jane states nonchalantly. She presses a thumb into the scarred centre of her hand.

Like the sky with fireworks, Maura's face is overcome with glee.

"Really? That's wonderful, Jane!" she all but squeaks. Jane would have scowled if the burst of excitement had come from anyone but the woman opposite her. She wonders briefly what that says about their friendship. She thinks about asking.

"What are you gonna put on yours?" she asks instead.

Maura plays with the purple ring on her finger, unsure of where to start. She hesitates. Jane thinks this is because she is terrified of being judged by her best friend. Perhaps the thought of Jane reacting negatively or cynically causes a spike of paranoia to prickle inside.

Bracing herself with a deep breath, Maura carefully chooses where to begin. Jane stretches her hand across to Maura's, rubbing her knuckles with the side of her thumb.

"Well, I've never been on a rollercoaster," Maura begins timidly. She gasps as Jane's hand clamps down on her own. Her eyes fly up to meet hers, and when she sees the jaw hung open and the chocolate eyes so wide they're almost white with shock, every muscle in her body tenses painfully tight.

"Maura, you've never...have you ever been to a fair?" she breathes, eyes flitting over her friend's face. Maura's expression is ashen; even the hot, embarrassed flush which attempts to surface doesn't have much of an effect. She shakes her head solemnly.

"No. My parents never took me and by the time I was old enough to take myself, it would have been too strange, Jane." Maura is still shaking her head slightly as she lowers it in shame. "I didn't have any friends to go with, either. But I've always wanted to know what it was like."

Jane can't believe what she is hearing. Her friend looks practically broken, all the pain from childhood once again seeping through like venom. Maura is so well put together on a daily basis, and yet she harbours so much internal loneliness and grief.

And to think that Maura considered Jane to be the stronger of the two.

She squeezes Maura's hand, willing her to look up at her. When Maura does, Jane is utterly unprepared for the devastating emotion she becomes pinned down with.

"Listen, Maura," Jane urges, ducking her head and smiling lightly. "You put that on your bucket list, and I'll take you. Whether it's at a fair or one of those theme parks near the outskirts of the city."

To her delight, Maura begins to smile fondly. She continues, more animated now. "And we're gonna get more candyfloss than you can handle. You'll probably spend most of the night telling me about all of the nasty, sugary chemicals in it but we're gonna eat it anyway cause that's what we do."

Maura's laughter makes her chest swell with relief and something that feels magnificent. Familiar and warm like home after a long day's work.

Wistfully, Jane imagines taking Maura to one of the shooting games at the fairs that she attended with her friends and brothers as a child. How she would use her advantage of being a trained cop to hit every target dead centre, just to win the prize for Maura. A teddy, cheap candy, something novelty; it didn't matter. Jane would be after one thing; that smile of pure bliss and innocence that Maura got when she experienced something for the first time and enjoyed it.

"So," Jane starts, "What else?"

"What about you?" Maura challenges, leaning forward over the kitchen island.

Jane isn't sure why the question stumps her. A memory floats through like a dream during a light dose.

Whenever Jane was a sophomore in high school, one of the girls she played softball with was called Holly McGonigale. Jane was very fond of both Holly and her younger sister, Shannon. But by the time Jane and her friends were getting excited about the summer break, Holly's mother Karen had been diagnosed with terminal illness.

The impact that it had on the girls was staggering. Holly dropped out of school, and Shannon began going less and less. Foreseeing the crushing weight that medical bills was going to have on them, Holly went out to work, juggling three part time jobs.

Softball wasn't an option.

Jane soon realised that hanging out after school wasn't either.

Still, the one thing that remains in Jane's mind is the last time that she spoke to Holly's mother. Karen McGonigale didn't look sick or frail. Her eyes were red rimmed, but then who doesn't need a good cry every once in a while? The lanky Italian teen had shuffled her feet, unable to maintain eye contact with the woman, until she told Jane something that she'd never forget.

 _"You know, you don't have to stand there all embarrassed, Jane Rizzoli. I know you know I'm gonna die. I've come to terms with it. But I know that it could be worse. Have you ever seen those kids in the hospitals? I feel so sorry for them. During the day, when their parents are at work and they're alone in their hospital beds with no one but the nurse that comes around every so often and can only stay for a few minutes with each one of 'em; they're all dying and some of them aren't even old enough to fully understand that._

 _Don't they get lonely, Jane?"_

Jane swallows, remembering how she stood slack jawed in the doorway of the living room that day. Unable to comprehend how someone could be in such a dire situation and still have so much sympathy for others.

When she shot herself in the gut, she thought for sure that she was going to die. The agony of the bullet ripping through her body sparked images in her mind; Frankie, her mother, Maura. Crashing into the hot, gritty sidewalk, her life flashed before her eyes. But as her eyelids closed and she lost consciousness, she remembers her final thought being Karen McGonigale and her words.

"Jane, are you alright?" Maura cut in.

Jane clears her throat, feeling the emotions dislodge themselves as she plants herself firmly back into the present.

"Oh just remembering an absent friend, that's all," she replies offhandedly.

"So?" Maura prompts.

Jane's tongue darts out to wet her bottom lip, and she nods before she speaks, affirming her decision. "I wanna visit a hospital, and go to the kids ward. Maybe dress up in one of those cartoon characters or something. Read them a few stories. Just be a friend for a while, I guess. Some charities look for volunteers all the time, right?" Jane breathes.

Maura's eyebrows rise, and she leans back, appraising the detective. "My, Jane that's a wonderful idea. What brought that on?"

Jane shrugs. "Something I've always wanted to do."

Maura nods her approval. "How about we write down a list of say..." She trails off, nibbling her bottom lip and nodding once more. "...twenty items. Then we can discuss."

Twenty two minutes of tapping at their smart phone keyboards, their only background noise the occasional sigh or cynical scoff, and their eyes meet once more.

The sensation of standing in front of an open fire with the flames dancing and heating her skin rises up in Jane, but she doesn't avert her gaze. Maura watches the crimson colouring rising up Jane's sharp cheekbones with interest. It makes Jane blush even more. After all, it was she, not Jane, who had been caught staring.

"Well," Jane starts, setting her phone flat on the table. "Do you wanna swap the lists and read mine?"

Accepting the suggestion, Maura gestures with her hand and gives her phone over to Jane. The brunette slides her own phone across the table. Taking a deep breath, Jane turns her gaze down to read the neatly laid out text on the phone screen;

 _Get a tattoo  
_ _Perform poetry  
_ _Learn to play an instrument  
_ _Learn a famous dramatic monologue by heart  
_ _Write down your regrets and burn them  
_ _Tell your best friend something that no one knows  
_ _Bake cookies  
_ _Sleep with a Boston woman  
_ _Build a fort  
_ _Go to a Boston Red Sox game  
_ _Watch a full pornographic film  
_ _Attend a political rally  
_ _Ride a rollercoaster  
_ _Flirt with a stranger  
_ _Go and see an indie band  
_ _Buy a random art piece  
_ _Shoot a bow and arrow  
_ _Drive a racing car  
_ _Buy coffee for a complete stranger  
_ _Write down your dreams for the duration of the bucketlist._

Jane has to read over the list a few times, seeing as some of the items shocks her so much that she forgets entirely what she's reading. She is buzzing with the need to question Maura on some of the things listed. Instead she grits her teeth and waits for the other woman to finish reading.

Successfully avoiding the temptation of watching Jane's reactions to each of the items on her own list, Maura concentrates on reading Jane's.

 _Get lost on purpose in a forest (Blindfold?- ask Maura)_  
 _Walk in the rain_  
 _Write poetry_  
 _Gatecrash a wedding_  
 _Watch a sunset and sunrise_  
 _Get dressed up and go to a fancy restaurant_  
 _Sit through an opera_  
 _Go to an unfamiliar bar_  
 _Buy everyone drinks at said bar_  
 _Start a bar fight (Don't get caught, Rizzoli)_  
 _Do karaoke_  
 _Kiss a woman_  
 _Get a lapdance_  
 _Dress up and go to a children's hospital_  
 _Go to a comedy club_  
 _Find someone with the same name_  
 _A random act of kindness_  
 _Repaint bedroom_  
 _Register as an organ donor_  
 _Write a note to yourself every day_

Just as Jane expected, it is Maura blurting out her surprise that breaks the silence.

"You want to kiss a woman?" Maura inquires, voice a higher pitch than usual.

Jane swallows and shrugs.

Both of them ignore the fact that, though Maura is a woman of little tact, she at least had the sense to avoid the fact she is using _kiss_ as a cover up for her real question. She wouldn't want to make Jane feel embarrassed about anything on the list. They hold a mutual bond of trust, in that respect. So Jane appreciates that Maura keeps her question limited.

Even if she does look like she is dying to know why Jane wants a lapdance.

"You know, Jane," Maura begins, her voice using the tone that lets the brunette know she's in for a lecture. "Drinking alone in an unfamiliar place is dangerous."

"Chasing murderers down alleys is dangerous too. I figured it would be a piece of cake," Jane says noncommittally, grinning at Maura, who frowns back at her. Jane snaps out of her reverie. "Wait, no what, Maura, you want to watch porno?! A _full_ porno. Start to finish. Jesus..."

Maura leans back in her chair, away from the ferocity of Jane's exclamation. "Nothing serious, Jane. It's just been a lingering curiosity that I've had. Have you read some of the statistics? It is a huge part of the modern culture, especially with the rise of the internet and the cyber age."

Jane puts her head in her hands and sighs.

She isn't sure she'll ever be able to understand Maura Isles.

But the fact that she warrants even a second of this genius' time makes her chest expand and every complaint drift away.

"Maura, why do you wanna build a fort and bake cookies?" Jane asks, as they exchange phones again.

Maura's breath catches in her throat. Even when she clears it, it sounds as if something sharp is cutting into her windpipe. "They were things that I didn't get to do as a child. You know how my parents were."

Jane doesn't have to answer. Neither of them have to elaborate. And once again Maura falls into the rut she calls absence of fond childhood memories. Jane becomes determined to pull her right back out.

"So, you wanna see the Red Sox, huh? I'm pretty sure that can be arranged!" she says cheerily.

Maura narrows her eyes, and then they widen again. In her haste, she blows right past Jane's conversation starter. "You want to go to the opera, Jane! That's so exciting!"

And it is terribly exciting indeed for the medical examiner. Jane knows the fact that she wants to dip her toe into the rich pool of culture that Maura was brought up in would make the doctor excited. The happiness shimmering in Maura's eyes makes Jane feel like there is a hummingbird inside of her chest instead of a contracting muscle. Though Maura would tell her that it's anatomically impossible, she can feel the fluttering beats of the hummingbird's wings even now.

And when Jane thinks she is finally setting herself free and becoming willing to explore same sex attraction, even if it's only a chaste kiss, a brief tangle of tongues or even an erotic dance, the hummingbird intensifies. It's the same tingles of excitement she feels but, with a shiver, she realises it's just a little lower down.

Her head is a mesh of moonlit bedrooms, sweat-slicked bare limbs and breathy sighs. Maura and another woman; exploring her own sexual identity. Though now the hummingbird is gone. Something ugly with claws grip Jane's ribs and tug them apart. The kitchen begins to spin away from her. She grips the granite. Thinks about police codes until the spinning stops and the blood circulates back into her brain.

"So," Jane says suddenly, her voice cracking from the hazy maze of sensual images in her mind's eye. "It's agreed on then."

Maura quirks her head. "It is?"

"Yes. We'll help each other complete our lists," Jane supplies, grinning from ear to ear as she holds her hand out over the island.

Maura gracefully accepts the hand, shaking it firmly and nodding decisively. "Yes. It's a deal."

They stare at each other. The air static and charged. Like bringing a knife to a gunfight, knowing for sure you're about to lose. It isn't a bet, it is a promise. _So why does it feel so dangerous?_ Jane wonders. Like they have just agreed to change their entire destiny in a single touch of palms.

"But Jane, you do know that as an upholder of the law, starting a bar fight is an unwise choice of action?"

Jane groans.


	2. The Heart In My Chest

Wow! You've all been pretty fab with your response to the prologue. Nobody has to worry about updates; this fic is complete and will be updated every sunday and wednesday. Also, check out the soundtrack to it. www.8tracks(.com)/lisajp4/the-bucketlist And, like I said, don't be shy! Follow me on twitter: at santonaranja

* * *

Maura's eyes flutter as the early Boston daylight filters in through the window. It falls in a shaft onto her bed, rousing her from her slumber.

She rubs her eyes and tries to orient herself into the present moment. A quick glance at her alarm shows her that she has woken up with a few minutes to spare.

She switches off her alarm, almost forgetting the red notebook that sits on her dresser. Reaching for the biro lying beside it, she uncaps the pen. She pauses and takes moment to recall her dream, before she reaches for the book itself.

 _Dream 1:_

 _I was in the heart of a forest, at a clearing which opened to a glittering lake. Lush green vibrancy pulsated all around me, stretching high above me and caressing my bare feet. The grass was so soft and warm beneath my feet. It felt like a plush rug; one that had been soaking up a crackling fire on a bitter winter's night._

 _The scene was purity and life._

 _This was being alive._

 _With the sun so high above me, I began to feel the affect of its rays. The middle of the day is the hottest. With every passing moment I realised more and more that I needed to dip my feet into the lake. To let the cool water lap between my toes._

 _Its chill would refresh me._

 _Revive me from the groggy haze that the heat caused me._

 _But to my surprise and despair, I neared the lake only to find that there was a large, jagged barrier erected around it. It trapped the haven of the cool water from me._

 _A sign read: 'To free yourself, you must face your biggest fear.'_

 _The idea of confronting any such fear struck such a terror in me that I was startled into a dark, unbroken slumber which ended only when I awoke this morning._

Satisfied that she has recorded her dream from the night before, Maura replaces the journal and pen on the nightstand. She wiggles her feet into slippers before making her way out of the bedroom towards the kitchen.

Clicking on her coffee machine and rebelting her silk robe, Maura ponders the meaning of her dream. As a scientist, she is sceptical that dreams are any form of coherent warning from a supernatural source.

She drums her fingertips on the granite island top and nibbles her bottom lip in concentration. She searches every crevasse of her mind, but eventually lets out a weary sigh and admits defeat as her coffee maker indicates that it is ready.

Out of the corner of her eyes, she sees Bass shifting towards her around the island. She beams down at him, crouching in order to gently run her hand over his shell.

"Bass, why would facing the fear of my old Russian ballet teacher emancipate me in any way?"

Standing to make her coffee, Maura pauses to shudder and mutter to herself and her tortoise.

"Terrifying. That woman was truly _terrifying._ "

* * *

Jane taps the back of her hand with the end of her pen. She growls in frustration and throws the pen on top of the blank sheet of paper. She is supposed to write a daily note to herself. Yet this morning she has no idea what she is going to record.

No memo, no idea, no thoughts or feelings.

The clean white paper mocks her from where it sits in front of her. She takes it, crumples it in her fists, tears it and chucks it in the direction of the trash. She grins proudly having rid herself of the annoyance. It quickly dissolves into a frown.

Now she has to go get herself a new piece of paper.

Sliding off of the kitchen stool, Jane saunters in the direction of her bedroom. She seriously underestimated just how difficult it was to put something substantial down on paper.

Jane reaches down and takes another sheet from the stack of paper she keeps next to her laptop. She straightens, glaring at the paper as she holds it away from her in her hands. She treats it like it is a contagious, contaminated object.

Its arrogance white brilliance is just as mocking as the last sheet of blank paper.

Jane grumbles on her way back to the kitchen, slapping the page onto the counter. Then she turns to make herself another cup of coffee. She had sat staring at the original piece of paper for so long, searching for inspiration to hit, that her first cup had gone cold.

There's nothing worse to Jane Rizzoli than a cold, stale, undrinkable cup of coffee.

She heaves out a weary sigh and rubs at her forehead. "Why the hell did I agree to this?"

Still, with a quirk of her lips into a smile, she thinks about the other things that she has to complete on her bucket list. And Maura's is even more interesting.

She is starting small with the notes.

She can't wait to see how Maura copes at a Red Sox game.

Jane's mirth is suddenly drawn into a frown when she recalls other items on the medical examiner's list. Like sleeping with a woman. Jane can't explain why when she thinks about Maura and another woman, her stomach muscles seize up. Her skin feels like it has been burned with acid.

She shakes herself out of her reverie as her kettle boils.

"I'm not homophobic," Jane declares aloud. She frowns. "Right...?"

Stirring the instant coffee into her mug, her mind drifts to her mother. Angela had been on Jane's back constantly since the shooting. Deep down underneath the scowling and aggravation, Jane understands her mother's fear.

Suddenly, Jane has the answer that she was looking for.

Grasping the pen from the countertop she begins to rapidly scribble on the page.

 _You are not having a midlife crisis. You are not turning into your mother. You will never turn into her. You are a badass._

Jane steps back to survey her work, a pleased expression on her face. Then she gets another idea, quickly adding.

 _Go Red Sox!_

Jane snickers at the page, setting the pen down and reaching for her coffee. She doesn't quite make it when a cold nose snuffles against her ankle. Looking down, she sees Jo Friday sitting patiently at her feet, waiting to be walked.

"Alright, let's go, Jo," Jane sighs. She knows that by the time she comes back, her coffee will have gone cold and she will have to remake it.

Again.

* * *

Steam hisses from the coffeemakers. Chirpy morning chatter rises from the cafe customers occupying the tables around her. Behind her, a man harrumphs into his handkerchief. His body-wracking coughs are so loud that the woman at the counter in front of Maura winces as she pays for her order.

Maura smiles as the barista spots her as next in line. Underneath the sweaty brow and the green brimmed cap, the young woman smiles widely back. Maura wonders if this is because she always remembers to tip well. For a wistful moment she pretends that is it because the barista is genuinely pleased to see a faithful, daily customer.

Pleased to see _her_.

By the time she reaches the counter though, Maura's mind is firmly fixed on the bucketlist. One item in particular is a repeated fugue in her mind. Buying coffee for a stranger.

"Your usual, Dr. Isles?" the young barista cheerfully asks; but Maura hears an edge to her voice. At first, she is almost offended. But it dawns on her that the young woman has been serving rude, petulant, impatient customers all morning. Will probably have to continue doing so until the end of her shift.

There is a weariness in the girl's lined face. It strains with the effort to remain inviting and courteous. Maura can tell that the end of shift is still some time away.

The medical examiner decides that what she is about to do is exactly the right thing.

Stepping closer to the counter, Maura nods, but before the barista moves to get her order, she holds up a hand. Frowning, the woman waits.

"Yes, the same for myself and Jane," Maura says brightly, rifling through her purse until she produces a $50 note. She places it on the counter, sliding it towards her. Maura thoroughly enjoys how the barista looks as if she is going to faint.

"And whatever the lady behind me is having," Maura whispers.

A glance behind her lets her know that her voice was low enough not to be heard. The woman in question continues to type furiously at her phone's keyboard. A small frown creases her forehead as her eyes flitter around the luminous screen.

The barista composes herself, "That's everything?"

Maura keeps smiling warmly as the woman meets her eye again. She shakes her head, tapping her fingertip on the note. "Keep the change as your tip today."

The barista swallows thickly, her eyes not comprehending whether this is a joke or not as the shock settles in. When she realises Maura's sincerity, they dance with delight. "Dr. Isles, I couldn't possibly-"

"I insist," Maura placates softly but firmly. "And please, call me Maura."

The woman's mouth works to form words, but she can't do it. Not a sound escapes. She's absolutely astonished. Speechless. Maura's incredible generosity has stolen the words straight from her mouth. Maura can see the red flush blossoming on the young woman's face; the burn of embarrassment that heats her. It is a sight and sensation that Maura knows too well herself.

"What's your name?" Maura asks.

"K-Kelly, my name is..." Kelly blinks rapidly, sucking in a breath and nodding her head as comes out of her shock and returns to her business. She takes the note and starts to press the relevant buttons on the till. Maura watches her face slip into a calmer state, even with flushed cheeks. Though the doctor also notices that the young woman's hands are shaking.

Maura patiently stands by as Kelly works to make her order. Her mind leaves the cafe and drifts to her work. Both herself and Jane are on call for the next few days. Unless Boston's darkest corners turn out a body, they have this afternoon and evening to spend together. The thought swirls in her gut as Kelly sets the two Styrofoam mugs on the counter.

"Thank you, Doctor Isles," Kelly says shyly. Her head lowers as if she is expecting the medical examiner to announce that the whole thing is a joke.

"No. Thank _you_ , Kelly. Have a nice day," Maura replies, turning to go.

The summer air envelopes Maura in familiar smells and sounds. The fresh morning dew still clings to the air, sticky and sobering. The cars blaring and the furious flapping of pigeon wings as they coo and flop to the pavement at her feet. Above all of this, Maura faintly hears a siren.

She hopes that it's a robbery, or some fighting; anything but a homicide.

She hates the attitude as soon as it bubbles up. She adores her profession. But she is so set on spending the day with Jane, she can't bear the thought of having it interrupted because they had to go to work.

Maura reaches her car when a voice calls out. "Doctor! Wait, please!"

Her head snaps up and around, alert. She thinks that it is a medical emergency. Then she sees that the woman hurrying towards her is the customer that she bought coffee for. She smiles nervously as the woman stands in front of her, slightly out of breath.

"Hi there," the unfamiliar woman greets, "I uh, I came to say thanks. For the coffee. But why...?"

Maura smiles widely and looks off down the street before returning her gaze to the stranger in front of her. "I've recently realised the desire to do something kind or new every day, in the hopes that it will make me feel more fulfilled," Maura says bluntly. The ecstatic expression on her face softens the meaning.

The woman smiles too; pure and genuine. Grateful. It is light and warm, surprising and contagious. Maura finds herself beaming back in equal measure.

"Man, he must be a fantastic guy to make you this happy. You're practically glowing, you're so happy!" the woman teases.

Maura's smile cracks. Her expression falls. Something flashes in the woman's eyes. She realises that she has poured salt on a raw wound before Maura can even speak.

"Shoot, I'm sorry," she back pedals, running the hand without the coffee cup through her hair. "I shouldn't have assumed-"

"No, no!" Maura rushes, seeking to quell the anxiety. "You aren't wrong, necessarily."

 _Where did those words come from?_

And yet, as the woman's face lights up again, Maura's chest is free of any hives. The twinkle in the woman's eyes brightens up, sparking back to life again. Maura's breath hitches as she sees she has missed yet another social cue.

"I see how it is. She must be one hell of a woman," the lady nods. At Maura's balking confusion, the woman waves her hand dismissively. "Don't panic. I'm not judging. In fact, my sister got married to her long term fiancée, Alison, just last month. They were beautiful-"

The woman glances down at her watch, and horror splashes across her face, dampening her gleeful eyes. "Aw shit," she complains, already staggering backwards. "I'm gonna be late." Before she twists away, she waves and grins once more at Maura. "Thanks again!"

Maura watches the woman hastily retreat in the direction, presumably, of her place of work. Now that the distraction of conversation is gone, the surrounding city comes back to her; birds, sirens and all. And yet, that isn't what causes the blood to pound in Maura's ears.

 _Why didn't I correct her?_

* * *

As soon as Maura enters Jane's apartment, the stench of paint scorches her nostrils. It almost knocks her right back out the door. Even when she manages a few steps inside, the room spins. Taking a deep inhale, the paint fumes swirl thickly in her lungs. She splutters and coughs into the hand not holding the styrofoam cup holder. Her eyes tear up.

After a minute or so, the irritation to her eyes and chest recedes, and she gulps in oxygen; fumes or no fumes. Blinking the room back into focus, she realises she is unlikely to make it much further than the sofa.

Every square inch of floor space is occupied. Everywhere Maura's eyes land is filled with wooden furniture or dirty clothing. She spots a hastily discarded BPD uniform lying across the couch, littered with miscellaneous objects. Jane's alarm clock is perched on top of her toaster. With her cleaning impulse flaring up, Maura's horrified eyes scan further up and around her.

She recognises the bedside lamp which provides a convenient home for three unmatched socks. The well worn boots sit pride of place on top of a thick-spined text of police code. The badge and gun, shining in the late morning sunshine, linger by their side. Her eyes meet the dismantled bed frame leaning against the fireplace.

Maura's alarm only increases.

A bark and excited thumping of a tail against something causes Maura to jump in surprise. As she turns in slow circles, she finds that she can't see Jo Friday anywhere. Even when she leans up on her toes to peer over some of the boxes, she cannot see the furry ball of energy. She tries again, avoiding the unstable piles of clothes by her feet. Her search is in vain. She only hears the impatient click of claws on wood.

In her periphery line of sight, a head pops into view. Jane's face is practically giddy, her ponytail swishing behind her. Ruby paint specks dot her cheeks, forehead and worn, grey tanktop. Maura raises her eyebrows in question.

"Hey Maura!" Jane greets, as her eyes zero in on the contents of her friend's hands. "Is that...?" Maura smiles at the implied question, nodding. Jane claps her hands together. "Sweet!"

Jane vaults, hops, skips and shimmies her way through the chaos of the living space. It defies any laws of physics of logic that Maura has ever known.

She takes the coffee from Maura and cradles it in her hands. She takes a long sip, savouring the taste. Then she wipes her speckled brow before sighing.

"Feel better?" Maura prompts knowingly, smiling in amusement as she does.

Jane smiles thinly. "Thanks, Maura. You're an angel."

Maura gives a small nod and looks away, though deep down she appreciates the sentiment. Every compliment from Jane, even if just a comment thrown back in passing, tastes sweet to Maura. It reminds her that she has come so far from being the only child roaming around a big house. The one reading medical journals instead of playing dress up. The one with parents always too busy organizing their latest exhibition or charity fundraiser.

Simply, it reminds her that she is no longer alone.

"So," Maura starts, running her eyes around the disaster zone. "I see you've decided to start with decorating you room."

Jane groans happily around the next gulp of warm coffee, nodding. "Yup. Thought I'd start somewhere, and here we are."

Another yelping bark and whine emerges from somewhere behind Jane's dismantled bed frame. Maura ducks her head to try and spot the small dog, but she is still unsuccessful. Watching Maura frown in concern, Jane can't stop the laughter that escapes. The medical examiner sharply turns towards the unexpected noise. When she sees the light dancing in Jane's eyes she can't help but smile brightly herself.

"May I see this bedroom or is it still a work in progress?" Maura asks.

Jane's eyes travels down to the floor, seeing the yellow shoes that Maura chose to wear this morning. She rolls her shoulders, taking a long slug of her coffee before raising an eyebrow at her friend. "If you can manage in those bad boys, feel free."

And Jane's off again, somehow edging her way through the mess. Maura's face turns sour. Though she takes a little longer than the detective, she stumbles her way to the bedroom doorway. She blinks in surprise at the interior of the bare room, seeing the morning's work adorning two and a half of the four walls.

Paintbrushes, rollers, trays, a colour filled bucket and a small stereo playing music are the only things that lie on the floor of the room.

Jane waves her free hand around. "Well?"

"Red, very sensual Jane," Maura says, impressed. She sees the relief blossom on Jane's face. It makes something sound in her mind that she could make such a strong, brave confident woman so nervous. The red of the walls is not a causal red, or even a blood red. It's desire, and passion, and lust. All written on the wall.

Maura wonders who the message is for. "Are you planning on having visitors?"

A sly smirk appears. Jane lowers her voice. "Now, Doctor Isles. A lady never tells."

Maura laughs airily, shaking her head as her hair bounces around her face. Somehow her friend always knew exactly what to say to get the best reaction from her. She thinks back to the woman outside of the cafe. Before she can latch onto the thought and question why it appeared back in her mind, it has drifted off.

And a new idea takes its place.

"Jane, I still keep a spare change of clothing here for running, don't I?" Maura inquires. Her brow furrows as she remembers how the last time they went jogging together was months ago.

Before Jane's shooting.

The feeling of ice melting and sliding down her spine occurs, making her clear her throat and shift in discomfort.

Jane tilts her head. "Yeah, why?"

Maura's smile is coy. "I'll help you finish the room."

Jane bounces on the balls of her feet. "Really?"

Maura shrugs and turns away. "Didn't we say that we would help each other finish our bucket list?" Jane nods her head, following her best friend. But before she can respond, Maura speaks again.

"And anyway, that's what best friends do."

Jane laughs as once more the unseen dog barks in the living room.


	3. Are You Ready For Me?

Guess who's just worked out that she's attracted to her best friend...

All feedback greatly appreciated!

* * *

Maura got a call around noon from Jane, asking if she would pick her up from Massachusetts General. Her heart went into a blitzing frenzy. It was frantically slamming inside her chest. It was trying to break out of her chest. She gripped the wheel and tried to stop hyperventilating.

The sharp, vivid menagerie of horrors flashed in her mind's eye. The many possible injuries that Jane could have sustained. It almost caused Maura to veer off of the road completely.

But now upon meeting Jane in the hospital, every one of her hypothesises drift away. All she can fuel her concentration with is how alive Jane is when she embraces her tightly.

Jane's arms fly up to cradle Maura against her. Surprised chuckles rumble in her chest even as the doctor presses her closer. She kisses the side of the medical examiner's head.

"You alright there, Maur?" Jane asks, coaxing the blonde backwards in order to look at her. "What's wrong?"

Maura opens her mouth, but shuts it. Embarrassment at her overreaction washes over her skin like ice water. She even gasps at the sensation. She takes two unsteady steps away from Jane. She puts a hand over her heart, willing it to stop pounding quite so hard. It is making her dizzy.

"I'm sorry, Jane. I thought something terrible had happened," Maura explains. Her eyes move to a notice board behind Jane's head. It is a splash of mismatching coloured leaflets and health warnings. Cheaply made after being half-heartedly churned out by government handled schemes.

Focusing on a poster for eating less red meat, Maura adds, "You rang me from a hospital with a lack of any explanation as to why you were here. Can you really find fault with my deep sense of concern?"

Jane slips her hands into the back pockets of her jeans. The pair are on call again today and so this morning Jane chose to dress casually. She is dressed simply in jeans and a Red Sox jersey. The sports attire was a present she received one snowy Christmas from Maura.

"I get it. You were worried. Let's not linger."

Slinging an arm around Maura's shoulders, Jane steers them around. They head for the double doors.

"So I'm thinking Marconi's for lunch?" Jane suggests, glancing at Maura, who seems perplexed. "Unless you've already eaten?"

"Wait, Jane. Why were you at the hospital in the first place?" Maura questions. The adrenaline rush dilutes into her system. It gives her a calm, humming feeling in her blood, just under the surface of her skin.

 _Or maybe it is how natural it feels to have Jane's arm around my shoulders._

As rare an occurrence as it is, Maura ignores her brain.

They come onto a set of stairs, descending them with the same fluid motions as if they were of one being.

"It was a sunny morning. I decided to take a nice long walk to the hospital, for fun," Jane drawls, but then grins. "And I registered as an organ donor."

Maura stops, wheeling around to face Jane fully. The flow of their conversation is interrupted as a crash trolley with half a dozen scrub-clad staff races past. When Jane's eyes float back to Maura's face, the doctor is almost glowing with pride.

"You became an organ donor? That's fantastic, Jane!"

Jane shrugs and nods for them to continue down the hallway. This time their steps are more paced.

"Yeah, I thought so. You never know when I'm gonna drop my guard or some perp'll get lucky." Jane winces as the words slip out. When Maura blanches, she dashes to hold the pieces together before they fall apart. Trying to lighten the mood, she says, "If I don't need my kidneys anymore, someone else is welcome to them."

Maura doesn't take the comment to heart, but she hates when they discuss the possibility of either of them dying.

"True. Which organs did you list?"

Jane laughs at the question that only Maura would be so concerned about. "Uh, all of them, I think. Heart, kidneys, liver-"

"Your liver?" Maura blinks, looking puzzled. "You listed your liver? Why?"

They glide through the hospital doors out into the sunshine. Jane slows as she processes Maura's response.

"Why not?" Maura can easily see the flicker of panic ensnares Jane's chest by the way she eyes dart over to her and around her face rapidly.

Maura smacks her lips together and waves a hand airily around Jane's side. "Well, who would want a liver with a hole in it?"

Jane stops dead as they reach the steps leading down into the car park.

Maura rests a few steps below her. She cranes her head back over her shoulder and shields her eyes with a hand from the glare of daylight. It is the kind of sunlight that made every pavement white and every patch of shade an oasis.

"Did you..." Jane shakes her head. "Did you just make a joke about my gunshot wound?"

Maura's coy smile and slight raise of her shoulder is her only reply. She continues down the stone steps. Jane chokes out a surprised laugh and hops down the remaining steps after her.

"Well, well, Dr. Isles. Who knew black humour was the key to your heart?" Jane teases, nudging her shoulder into her friend's.

"Need I remind you, Detective Rizzoli, that I am a coroner?" Maura throws back, her voice cut and yet light. Her eyes glitter with humour.

They reach the Prius in quiet. There are smiles on their faces the whole time.

As soon as Jane's backside has hit the car seat, Maura has sunglasses outstretched towards her. Closing the car door and gratefully taking the sunglasses, Jane's grin spreads wider.

"You always think of everything, don't you?"

Maura hums in disapproval, shaking her head as she puts on her seatbelt. "Not everything, Jane. I don't have to tell you again of the conference in New York last month. It was forecast to be a week of sun, and therefore, when torrential rain hit I was left without a coat or umbrella."

Jane chuckles as she reaches for her own seatbelt.

"So, are we going to Marconi's?" Maura asks, staring the car and fixing her wing mirrors, adjusting them slightly.

Jane pulls down the sun visor, checking herself in the mirror she finds. "Yup. Then we're heading over to Philip's."

Backing out of the parking space, Maura frowns in confusion. "Philip? Who is Philip?"

"You'll see later," Jane says dryly.

The medical examiner notices that Jane's knee is bouncing. It is something which only occurs when the detective is gut-wrenchingly anxious. Or when she is brimming with childlike excitement.

Jane's upper body is relaxed, sank back into the seat. And her nails haven't been bitten down to the bed. Therefore, Maura concludes that whatever Jane has omitted to tell her isn't life-threatening.

Still, after a few minutes of terse silence, Jane sighs. "Look, Maura. I figured we could go knock some stuff off of our bucketlists. We're free again today, right?"

"We are on call, Jane. There's a difference," Maura says sternly.

Behind her sunglasses, Jane Rizzoli rolls her eyes. "Yeah. And that difference is that unless someone shoots someone else dead or a body surfaces on a beach somewhere in the bay, we aren't working today. Ergo, we are free."

Maura huffs through her nose, a sure sign of her disappointment in Jane's attitude. "So, who is Philip?" she steams.

"He owns an archery club," Jane says, staring out of the window. With her tone of voice, she pretends that it is as dull a statement as contemplating the pleasant weather outside.

Maura almost steers them off of the road. "What?" she squeaks. "We're going...what?"

Jane finally turns back to face her. Though Maura is wearing sunglasses, the high eyebrows clarify the total sense of surprise she feels.

"Yup. I figured since we're on call then we could use that free time to tick a few things off of our lists today," Jane says. She leans back in her chair and tilts her head back against the headrest.

The roaring of the engine accelerating is the only answer she needs. Jane laughs.

* * *

Royal blue and virgin white and blood red, swirling in their boldness. Standing out from the otherwise unbroken, blurring thicket of greens and browns.

 _How patriotic,_ Maura ponders, running her fingertips over the edge of the bow. It was hand carved, or so Jane says, but if it was then the creator was an exquisite worker. A master of their craft. She curls her hand around the grip and braces it straight out at her side. It may be her imagination, but it certainly feels as if it were made just for her hand.

The sharp rattle of Jane throwing the quiver to the ground at their feet startles Maura.

"Hey, Maur, need any more one on one time with your new buddy there?" Jane asks, winking as she bends to retie her laces.

But Maura doesn't hear her. The medical examiner is frowning at the candy coloured tipped arrows in their encasement.

"The quiver doesn't go on my back?" she murmurs. She knows she sounds so much like a crest-fallen child. She doesn't care.

"No, Robin Hood. Unfortunately, there's no strap on the quiver. Maybe cause of the kiddie accident here a few years ago..." Switching to her other foot, Jane looks up at Maura, grinning at her friend's pout. "However, feel free to whip out some of that medical tape and we'll secure it on you."

Maura Isles shakes her head but offers a hand to pull Jane to her feet anyway. An affectionate hand brushes her shoulder and she is rewarded with another wink.

It is always like that for Maura. Any light teasing is followed by a warm gesture. As if Jane sees the layers of hurt caused by years of childhood isolation and neglect. Upon realising that she could have added a new wound to old scars, she immediately seeks to wipe it away.

Jane seeks forgiveness with a reverent touch, and Maura always grants it.

Redemption is freely given in Maura's dazzling smile.

"So, ready to ping the string?" Jane nudges Maura's shoulder with her own.

Maura's jaw works, and she raises the bow a little before shyly looking up through her eyelashes.

"I've never done this before. I'm-I'm not entirely sure of the correct procedure..." Maura admits, her posture deflating.

Jane's mouth quirks. Something sarcastic is biting at the tip of her tongue, Maura can tell. But she softens at Maura's embarrassment.

"Hey," Jane soothes. Her voice is a low burr which heats Maura's stomach like whiskey on a December evening. "Everyone's got a first time, right? That's why we're here."

Firstly, Jane reaches for Maura's wrist, checking the straps on the arm guard. Then she slides her hands up Maura's bicep to check the straps on the chest pad. Clicking her tongue on the roof of her mouth in approval, Jane nods sharply and steps back. Almost like an Olympic gymnast does when they have finished their back-breaking routine.

Maura watches this curiously, unable to hold in the tide of her intrigue.

"You've done this before," Maura says bluntly.

Jane's eyes flit up to hers, surprised at the sudden comment. She shrugs, staring off at the long row of targets for a minute. Pinpointing the centres with a hawk-like precision, before a nostalgic glow permeates her features.

"Yeah, I guess. A few times. I used to love this as a teenager. We used to do it for summer camp or after softball practise back when Philip's dad owned the place. Philip took over when his dad got sick a few years back," Jane says. She uses both of her hands to run through her thick hair, shaking some of it away from where it was caught in the straps of her own chest pad.

Maura notices, since she knows Jane Rizzoli so well, that this is just a ploy to keep her hands busy when she gets restless. There's a bad memory there, something dark and graphic. Something that isn't suitable for the sunshine. Nor the whistle of the summer breeze high in the treetops above them. She drops it and waits for Jane to come back from wherever her mind took her.

"So," Maura starts, tactfully moving away from the darkened mood that had settled over them. "How, precisely, does one of these arrows end up embedded in that target?"

Jane sniffs nonchalantly, coming out of the mental rut, and bends to snatch up one of the arrows. Maura relaxes when Jane stands, wearing a broad smile. The detective gestures with the plastic arrow, indicating Maura's feet.

Maura looks down. She sees a white line running straight between them. It is like a physical manifestation of a barrier that neither of them ever dare cross.

Maura wonders if they'll ever acknowledge it.

Jane steps around behind her without Maura even noticing. An arrow is being handed to her. And then hands are on her hips. Maura gives a start.

Jane chuckles in her ear from behind her. "Relax, Maur. You just gotta adjust your stance here." She gently applies pressure to Maura's hips, guiding her into the correct position, a foot either side of the white line.

Maura's heart beat quickens; could Jane read her mind? Just a moment ago she considered the white line as some sort of physical dividing line. There but never seen. And now Jane had seen it; and stepped them both straight over it.

Jane is speaking and Maura is not listening. She berates herself. What a terrible student she is being.

"...Nock the arrow. So just raise your...here, I'll help ya," Jane trails. Her hands slip up from Maura's hips to her biceps. Together, they manoeuvre Maura's arms so that the bow is down, ready for the arrow.

And together, they set the arrow to rest in the groove.

They are fitted so closely. Against her back, Maura can feel Jane's ribcage contract with every breath that she takes in. The exhales tickle the back of her neck where she has tied her hair back. The heat of Jane's body is making tingles zip up and down Maura's spine.

Fear prickles her skin and scalp when she thinks of how Jane might notice how terribly the bow and arrow are shaking.

"That's it Maura," Jane encourages, her words a murmur behind Maura's ear. "Now use three fingers to pull back the string."

Maura isn't sure if she does or not. At the present moment, the world is narrowing into a fine point. All sound that isn't Jane's husky voice is drowned out into a dead static white noise. For a second, she suspects that she is suffering from a panic attack. The effort to compartmentalise the devastating effect of these sensations proving to be too laborious for the system to cope.

Faintly, she notices her bow start to rise into the air.

"That a girl, Maura!" Jane whispers. They are practically cheek to cheek; every so often their warm, soft skin grazes against each other. Maura's entire being could be made of collapsible cardboard at this moment. Sweat beads on the edges of her forehead.

A scarred palm curls further around Maura's where she holds the string back. The tension which thrums in the taunt string is electrified by the two women.

"Ready?"

 _Am I?_ The doctor panics.

"Let go, Maura," Jane urges.

And Maura's fingers release the string.

The arrow whizzes straight through the air, burying itself into one of the red hoops. It is an impressive first score.

Maura would be proud if she wasn't currently swaying on her feet, slack jawed and blank stared. Jane moves away, whooping and hollering at how good Maura's first ever shot was.

The doctor misses her heat immensely.

Ironically, Maura can't remember the moment in which the arrow embedded itself in the target. Her mind was too fogged with a devastating realisation;

The realisation that she was attracted to her best friend.

* * *

Maura hasn't stopped taking for the last twenty minutes.

Jane hasn't stopped laughing for the last twenty minutes.

They sit in matching pearly jumpsuits. Their large helmets are in the vacant seats beside them as they sit in the track cafe. They sip coffee and nibble on the cinnamon pastries on the paper plates in front of them.

"It was simply exhilarating!" Maura rushes, her blonde curls bouncing as she waves enthusiastically.

Jane shakes her head, another laugh spluttering out of her. "So I take it you enjoyed yourself?"

"Enjoyed myself?" Maura parrots incredulously. "Why Jane..."

And she's off again.

The evening is starting to get dark outside. The little eatery is buzzing with energy from those that wish to refresh themselves. Especially following an afternoon of shooting around the racing track.

Jane knows that Maura was terribly unsure of herself when she first heard of the speeds at which the cars went along at.

But when she got behind the wheel herself, Jane notes, it was an entirely different story.

"...and the squealing of the wheels was simply sublime. Who knew the smell of rubber could be so...pleasant?" Maura gushes, before finishing her coffee in one swift gulp.

Jane rips tiny slits in the edge of her paper plate, beginning at one side and gradually inching her way around. She knows that she is grinning like a fool, but at that moment she doesn't really care.

"Well I'm glad you liked it," Jane says softly.

Maura regards Jane with an affectionate expression.

For the first time, Jane is struck by how extraordinary their bond of friendship is. The fact that this intelligent, established woman sitting in front of her is watching her tear up a cheaply manufactured paper plate. Is willing to spend her free time taking archery lessons or flying around a race track. Is sacrificing the meagre, precious time off that she affords as a chief medical examiner.

It astounds her.

The mixed poison of feeling ashamed and humbled makes her feel like her veins are raw and enflamed.

"So what have you ticked off your list so far?" Maura asks quietly.

"Umm," Jane segues, tilting her head. "Repainted my bedroom, wrote a note everyday so far and joined the donor register."

Before Maura can list her own achievements, a rough voice croaks behind her head.

"Rizzoli?"

Jane's eyes lift until they meet the voice. Then her entire face brightens with surprise. Maura turns around to see who the person is.

A large, broad shouldered man hobbles towards them, his own jumpsuit black. He hefts a jet black, scuffed helmet under one of his meaty arms. His bland, red face is cracked with an expression akin to glee.

Once he reaches the table, his bushy grey eyebrows rise high on his lined, crimson forehead. "And Isles, I see?"

Maura blinks.. "I'm...I'm terribly sorry...I'm not sure I..." she stutters politely, looking at Jane for help.

But Jane is standing and laughing as the man brings her into a tight hug. The man's huge hand thumps Jane on the back, pushing a wince out of her.

"Jeez, Jane, I haven't seen you since your drug unit days!" the man remarks.

Jane discreetly reaches for Maura's hand, which is fidgeting on top of the table.

"Relax, Maur," she says calmly, straightening up again. She lets go of Maura's hand and places her other hand on the burly man's shoulder. "This is James Michael. He taught me how to drive a cop car back when I was a beat cop."

"Damn fine beat cop you were too! Fierce as hell. Tough as nails. Fiery Italian temper. What a force!" James bellows cheerfully, arm around Jane's shoulder as he faces Maura.

Jane is staring at the ground, grinning sheepishly.

"So, Doctor Isles, what are you doing out with this loser?" James teases playfully, laughing loudly as Jane digs him in the ribs.

"Jane isn't a loser. She's a wonderful woman, and a valiant detective," Maura defends impulsively. Her hand escapes from where it danced on the table. It settles down on her lap with her other. She presses them down in order to stop them skittishly dancing on the table with nerves. Jane notices, but doesn't mention it yet.

Again, James's bushy eyebrows rise up in surprise. He guffaws, holding his belly for a moment before adjusting his jumpsuit slightly. Jane slides down back into her side of the booth.

"Well, I'm gonna head back out here. Was nice to see ya, Rizzoli. We need to catch up good and proper some time. You two get home safe now," James says sincerely. The happiness never leaves his red face. He picks up his scratched helmet from where he left it on the table. Nodding once at each of the women, he turns and starts to stagger off towards the cafe door.

"You've got a good one, Rizzoli!" James calls over his shoulder, just as his black jumpsuit disappears through the door.

Jane's face scowls, but she waves a hand at him anyway in goodbye. The detective focuses on Maura. Her smiles drops when she sees the anxious face of the woman opposite her. Immediately, a scarred hand reaches across the table, palm up, waiting to be filled. Like clockwork, a shaky hand cautiously emerges from under the table to clasp it.

Seeking strength.

Wanting stability.

"Maura, what's up? What's wrong?" Jane asks in concern.

"I just... Who was that man?" Maura rasps.

"Oh...an old work colleague, James-"

"How did he know me, Jane?" the doctor breathes.

Jane's eyes widen and her mouth opens. She is frozen like that for a second in time. Eventually Jane buries her face in her other hand and forces down a chocked laugh. She mumbles something into her hand.

"I'm sorry, I didn't hear that," Maura utters.

Jane raises her head, her expression shy. "This is so embarrassing..."

Jane heaves a deep breath. She traces her eyes once around the cafe before her shoulders straighten. She captures Maura's insecure eyes with her own. The hand holding hers squeezes encouragingly.

"Remember when we first met, you thought I was a hooker but I was undercover for the drug unit?" Jane begins. Maura nods faintly. "Well pretty much that day we cracked that case and got the perp. Total bastard he was..."

Jane feels bile rising her throat and her stomach resembles a molten tar pit. She remembers that case. Although Hoyt makes it to the top spot on her list of nightmares that she would rather forget, it still ranks high. She clears her throat, not wanting to leave Maura hanging.

"The drug unit took me out that night to the Robber to celebrate. James was celebrating his first grandson being born, but joined in our party cause he'd practically taught us all to drive in the cop cars as rookies. Homicide were all there too. It was the night Korsak approached me, telling me that Detective McManus was transferring all the way down to New Orleans, and if I'd be interested in a homicide spot."

Brown eyes shimmer now in the lights of the petite cafe. That memory is one of the few times that Jane allows her altruist, humble nature to be set aside, and a spark of pride to break through.

" _Anyway,_ as the night wore on and we all got a few drinks down our necks, according to James all I could talk about was the woman in the cafe. The woman who offered me money to eat, even though I was a trashy stranger. There she was, an image in clothes that cost more than my car at the time, and she didn't even look down her nose at a hooker."

Maura's cheeks flush. "I craved a companion so much at that time in my life that I didn't think I had the right to look down on another person," she confesses.

"So we're still discussing this _amazing_ woman when Korsak sidles himself over to the bar. He's there to ask me if I considered his offer. But then he catches wind of the conversation and starts laughing his head off," Jane explains. "Turns out this _woman_ was the new Chief Medical Examiner."

"I had no idea that I made any impact on your the first time we met," Maura admits. "In fact, the first time that I really remember thinking about you was when we first cooperated on a case..." She trails off, and then scoffs. "Frankly I got a shock when I looked up from the body to see who the new detective looming over me was."

Jane grins, but continues undeterred. "And as for recognising you? He probably knows you from the paper. You're pretty well known in Boston and beyond, Maur," Jane says.

The medical examiner shrugs her shoulders. "I didn't...I've never actually..." She pauses. Letting the disjointed speech fall away. The correct thought slots into place before continuing. "I take it all for granted. My adoptive heritage. My family name. My social status-"

"No, Maura!" Jane shakes her head vehemently. "Your _achievements._ You are an amazing woman. Well accomplished, totally put together. You're a medical examiner and a philanthropist and a tortoise owner. You're smart and quirky and beautiful," Jane hisses. She cups Maura's hand in both of her own. Her eyes shine with emotion that she isn't sure she will ever be able to put into words. She hopes Maura will one day understand just how much she means to Jane.

"Thank you," Maura replies hoarsely.

Jane allows the moment to settle before she says, "I think we should go grab dinner before this turns into a sob fest, don't you?"

The pair stand. Jane curls her hands into fists. They suddenly feel empty and cold. Her scars don't ache but her heart seems to. She ignores the sensation.

"Would you like me to prepare something? I think I have some sweet potatoes that would go beautifully with-" Maura starts to suggest.

"No!" Jane cuts in, grinning like a child as they move towards the cafe door. "We've just been driving. We have to eat the cheapest, greasiest hamburgers that we can find."

Maura shakes her head in opposition, but her stomach clenches in approval. It grumbles loud enough for Jane to hear. The detective winks, continuing to stride confidently through the door.

"You're a terrible influence on me, Jane Rizzoli," Maura huffs, just as the bell above the door tings behind them.


	4. All Your Dreams Are Made

Thanks to everyone reviewing/reading! Glad everyone seems to be enjoying it so far. Now, in this chapter I've written my own personal spin on a Hoyt flashback. I'm not sure it works in canon, but it makes for a nice anecdote to strengthen Jane's direction of thoughts. It may be a duller chapter for some of you, and that's okay. Plenty more fun to come in the future.

Be sure to drop me a line and tell me what you think!

* * *

Maura looks at Bass, and Bass looks back.

She is bursting with feeling, her mind racing almost as fast as her pulse. Although she knows that it is impossible, her skin could well be in flames. Pure heat courses through her. Hot enough to melt steel. Her blood feels thick in her veins, heady and scathing.

She feels need, desire. The hunger for a lover to take her to bed. For the pair of them not to emerge from the damp, sweat slicked covers. Not until they are both achingly satisfied.

Her left eye twitches. Her hand curls around the morning mug of coffee it holds in a white knuckled grip.

It is a mirage of sensations that she has not felt in a long time. Not, she notes, since she had been with Ian. It is all because of the dream that she had the night before. The one that cannot recede from her mind even though she has been awake for two hours, and-

She glances at the corner of the news banner on the muted television-

Forty three minutes. She is up early; too early. Maura Isles is no late sleeper but she was awake and in her kitchen making coffee three hours before her alarm was programmed to go off. The cup in her hand is her third attempt but it may as well be her first. The two before it went cold because she became do entangled in her dream from the night before.

Yes, she recorded it. Every detail of the tastes, sounds and sensations that she experienced. The phantom hands even now settle on her skin for a moment.

Maura thinks back to the frenzied nature of the love making that she and Ian participated in when volunteering in Africa. They were frequently in life or death situations. All kinds of perilous militias and diseases crawled along the plains of Africa with them. Any day could be their last and they knew it.

Retrospectively, Maura realises that this may not have been the smartest decision. Yet she can't deny that those nights that they shared in material tents, their bodies slick with perspiration even as the temperature in the desert lands plummeted, she felt truly alive.

They held each other so close afterwards. Inside they knew that the only thing each of them really had was each other.

It makes her curious as to why she would suddenly dream about that form of sexual release once more. Especially since she has been so comfortable with her sexual exploits thus far on her return to Boston.

Safe, albeit passionless.

Maura searches every nook and cranny of her headspace. What has brought on the crackling of hunger? It makes her shiver every time her conscious remembers her dream. She cannot find an answer. She sips her coffee, but it has a bitter taste as it slides down the back of her throat.

She doesn't know what she is feeling at the moment. Her blood pressure has barely lowered since the last time she dug two fingertips into her jugular. That was almost ten minutes ago. She isn't sure how she feels about that.

Maura is still looking at Bass, and Bass is looking back.

* * *

Jane's eyes dart up to the rearview mirror again. She sees the frustrated crimson face of the driver in the car behind her. The woman's brow glistens with sweat as she huffs out exasperated gasps. Occasionally, she barks at her two bawling children in the backseat.

Jane has never been more grateful for the well-ventilated air condition system in her car.

Pushing her sunglasses a little further up the bridge of her nose, Jane blows out a breath. She drums her fingers restlessly on the steering wheel.

 _Just a little longer_ , she thinks.

After counting to ten for the fourth time, the traffic lights eventually turn green. With a relieved sigh, she guns the car across the junction.

There is a little guilt at taking such a liberty with the police technology in order to pursue today's objective. Mostly she is a bag of nerves. Of course, she isn't quite sure about the root source of her anxiety. However, she is almost certain that it is connected to the fact she'll be meeting someone with the same name as her.

Turning off to her right, the tall buildings recede. Hectic traffic gives way to a quieter section of Boston. Ducking her head below her sun visor, Jane scans the street names as they pass. She continues following the route that her SatNav is dictating to her. Finally, the desired store front appears. Jane pulls in, neatly parks the car and kills the engine.

The sudden silence and stillness in the car delivers her some frightening clarity. Doubts and uncertainty fly about her head, as real and agitated as a hive of bees. She shakes her head and pushes it all away, forcing it all from her even as it attempts to creep back.

"Here goes nothing," she breathes. She throws open the door and steps out of her car.

Janine Ann-Marie Rizzoli owns a charity shop, buried deep into suburban Boston territory. Relying on public donations, it endeavours to support and rehabilitate soldiers who return from combat. Those with wounds both physically and psychological. It helps them receive the help they need, subsidizing the cost of their healthcare.

It isn't exactly the name Jane Rizzoli, but it was close enough for the detective.

Jane shrugs off her jacket, slinging it over her shoulder. Once exposed to the full glare of the sun, everything feels clammy and sticky. The sunglasses remain on her face as she appraises the shop front. Poised, headless mannequins and various scattered items stare right back at her.

She notices a stray thread on her T-shirt. Glancing left and right, she swiftly swipes it away, hoping no one noticed. Deeming herself at least presentable, she eases herself through the door into the shop.

Rails of clothes are there to greet her. The walls are lined with bookshelves of mismatched wood colouring and different shapes. Above her, a ceiling fan whirs. Jane shifts, and a floorboard creaks. In the dead silent store, it is like bad horror movie sound effect.

"Hello?" Jane croaks, her voice unexpectedly dry. She clears it, ready to call again when a head pops up from underneath the counter at the rear of the shop. Jane is so startled that muscle memory tells her hand to reach for her gun. But it isn't even strapped to her side. She left it in the cruiser. The idea of carrying seemed like a bad one when she was visiting an establishment which helped soldiers with PTSD.

 _Easy, Rizzoli._

A blonde haired woman with a smirk and narrowed eyes stands up, leaning across the counter. "Can I help you?"

Jane licks her lips. "Umm, yeah actually, I was wondering if you knew someone called-"

"Can you read?" the woman interrupts.

Jane shuffles her feet, confused by such a rude intrusion. And yet the woman is now grinning slyly. Subconsciously, Jane runs a hair through her hair and skims it over her hip. She tries to find something that the woman found so humorous. "Excuse me?"

The woman gestures past Jane's head. The detective blinks, slowly turning her head. There is a sign on the door which says OPEN. _Which means that on the side facing the street it says..._

"Oh shoot!" Jane hisses, turning back to face the blonde woman. "I'm sorry I didn't..."

The woman chuckles, waving a hand through the air. Jane relaxes a little, rocking back from the balls of her feet. "It's okay, honey. I was just about to reopen after lunch."

"Anyway, how can I help you?" she asks.

"I'm looking for Janine Rizzoli?" Jane responds. The name feels clumpy and thick on her tongue, as if she is trying to eat badly made custard rather than speak. The thought of saying her own name and referring to someone other than herself is something she never prepared for. Nor thought she _had_ to prepare for. And yet, here she is.

"You're looking at her," Janine replies. She braces her elbows on her counter as she flicks a strand on her hair away from her face.

The two women stand there staring at each other for a minute. A minute which stretches to the point of discomfort. The ceiling fan continues to whirl unbridled above their heads. A car's muted horn is heard somewhere outside.

"So," Janine segues, making Jane shift her position as she presses her thumb into one of the scars on her hand. "Can I help you with something specific?"

"I'm here to make a donation actually," Jane says uneasily.

 _When did I become a nervous teenager?_ No, untrue. She was a brazen teenager who played sports with the boys and stood up for her brothers. She was more likely to get into playground scraps than into a frilly dress. So why now does the onslaught shyness paralyse her?

The store-owner grins again. Jane has no idea why it simultaneously makes her smile weakly back and feel sick to her stomach.

"That's exactly what I like to hear," the blonde woman approves. She waves Jane over closer to the counter, dipping down underneath it and rooting around to find something. Jane approaches the counter with the fear that her knees are going to buckle inwards before she gets there.

Janine doesn't even notice. She fiddles with something unseen on her desk, scowling at it in frustration. Finally she discards it with a grunt.

Jane's hands grip the wooden counter top as she regains her equilibrium. She ponders how she can stare serial killers and brutal rapists in the face and be secure and level-headed. Yet now she can barely speak to a charity shop owner with badly bleached roots.

"If I could just take your name and address?" Janine prompts, not raising her eyes as she reaches for a pen.

Jane's jaw locks. The attempt at speech sounds as if she is being strangled. Janine clicks her pen impatiently, before looking up through eyelashes thick with black mascara.

"Come on now. I don't bite...much," the woman teases, her eyes sparkling with humour.

Jane tries to clear her throat, but it is far too dry. Inwardly, she curses the heat and the nerves. _What would Maura do?_

"That is kinda the thing," Jane breathes, rubbing her sweaty palms together. It was as if she was staring off of a cliff, watching the white waves crash mercilessly against jagged rocks.

 _Gotta jump now that you've made it this far._ "My name is Jane Rizzoli."

The woman's head jerks upwards. Jane prepares herself for the torrent to come spewing forth. The _Is this a joke?_ And the _Just who the hell do you think you are?_

Janine's eyes narrow to a squint.

But the incredulous tide never comes.

Instead Janine bobs down below the counter, disappearing from the detective's line of sight. Jane jumps as a newspaper is slapped down in front of her. Licking her thumb and forefinger, the blonde woman skims through the pages. A fingernail taps a large colour photo of a grinning, rookie Jane Rizzoli, her peaked police cap taming the dark curls of her hair. Her teeth gleaming in a prideful smile.

"Jane Rizzoli, hero cop, right?" Janine asks, her eyes following the words of the article. "I knew I recognised you."

A familiar sense of discomfort overcomes Jane. Her fingers flex in and out of fists as she swallows and considers her response. Over and over she has had this same argument with Maura, Frost, Korsak, her mother and her brother. Jane does not see herself as a hero. If anything, it was Maura who saved Frankie's life, and that is what matters to her the most.

"Interesting," Janine muses, unfazed by her customer's dilemma. She closes the paper and leans on it with her elbows, her chin on her hand as she took in Jane with new eyes. "So what can I do for ya, Detective Rizzoli?"

Instinctively, Jane's hand palms her hip, feeling for the weight of her gun and badge. A flush of panic runs through her again when she finds them both absent. Forcing herself back to the safe surroundings of the charity shop, Jane fakes a wide smile.

"Well, Janine-"

"Oh please," the shop-owner dismisses, "Call me Jam."

Jane blinks, raising her eyebrow precariously. "Jam?"

"Janine Ann-Marie," Jam explains. "Catholic mother, you know how it is."

This fills Jane with hearty laughter. The kind that makes her heart feel like it is beating in her skull and her stomach feels like empty space. It is a glorious turning point.

"Oh believe me, I do."

The women talk freely after that, smiling and nodding and feeling absolutely at ease. They discuss Jane's donation. Momentarily, they are interrupted at intervals by customers and fellow donators who are eager to leave in items.

It is when a man and his young son carry in four large cardboard boxes filled to the brim with books that Jane gets an idea. She remembers how one of the points on her bucket list is a random act of kindness.

 _Killing two birds with one stone._

"This is gonna take me at least two hours to inventory," Jam sighs despondently, her hands on her hips.

"Uh, I'll help if you want," Jane suggests, peering at the titles in the box closest to her.

Jam turns to her. "Aren't you supposed to be off solving murders or chasing bad guys or...whatever it is you cops do with taxpayers' money."

Jane smirks, gesturing to her civilian clothes. "Got the late shift tonight."

Jam returns the smirk, gratitude radiating from her expression.

And that was that. Twelve minutes later and they were both grappling with book piles, categorising genres and frantically scribbling down authors' names.

"So Jane," Jam segues, squinting at a little black novel. "What made you want to be a cop?"

Jane drums her pen against her thigh for a minute. She runs the alphabet over in her head before rearranging four books in a row. "I was no good at math," she replies dryly, reaching for the next in her box.

Jam splutters in response, nodding at the detective. "Good one. You're funny."

Jane rolls her eyes, but smiles nonetheless. There is something to be said for helping someone with an unpleasant task. The camaraderie which rapidly forms in unlike anything else in the world. Strong and random and brilliant.

Jane vaguely recalls Maura telling her something about human interaction and human endurance. But as she reaches for the memory it eludes her. It leaves only the recollection of a dazzling smile, golden hair and soul-searching eyes.

"What made you want to start a charity for returning soldiers?" Jane asks, frowning as she reads the cover of a strangely bound book. Opening the book in the middle and flicking through, she realises it is in a different language. Eyes widening, Jane carefully sets it back down. Glancing over at Jam, she sees that the other woman has stopped completely. She is staring in melancholy at a patch of ground near her feet.

 _Idiot Rizzoli. Frickin' idiot._

"I-I'm sorry? Did I say something...?" Jane chokes quickly.

Jam's face grows nostalgic. Bittersweet memories flooding warmth through her cheeks and into her smile. Even when her eyes glisten with emotion. Jane feels like she is being witness to something almost religious. She feels inadequate, like she doesn't deserve to be here as she sees such an intimate moment pass over this stranger's face.

"My husband died in the Iraq war. Marcus Rizzoli," Jam begins finally, her eyes shooting from the floor to the ceiling. Jane's hands itch at her sides. "Actually, saying I lost him _to_ the war is more accurate."

Jane can't help herself; "What do you mean?"

Jam runs her fingertips over the box that she had been working with. Yet her eyes indicate that she is far away from the charity shop on a hot Boston afternoon. She is somewhere that Jane cannot see, or hear, or touch. "Marcus died the day he boarded a plane bound for the Middle East. He didn't come back the same man."

Jane lowers her head. She knows what that feels like. To begin as a young, energetic and able fighter, and to return lost to the ghosts that live behind your eyes.

 _Hoyt. Marino. And those from her drug unit days..._

 _Poor Yolanda._

 _I'll never forgive myself or Martinez._

Jam's fingers continue to drift across the box's edge. "He lasted a year back home. And then he took his own life," she says. The words are so faint that Jane struggles to decide whether or not what she thought she heard was what she _really_ heard. "He was my life, and I lost him to enemies that only he could see."

Jam looks up at Jane then, fully back in the room. She has the pleading eyes of one about to teach an important life lesson. The desperation lingering that someone will learn from terrible mistakes.

"You look like a pretty brave woman, Jane. Independent, strong, sacrificing. Jeez, you even got your picture in the paper." The detective smiles grimly at this. "But you gotta know that sometimes in life, we outta let people be brave for us."

Jane looks away for a moment, too shy to accept the compliment that she is a courageous cop. She lets the message sink in for a moment. She remembers the hospital after Hoyt, her hands being bandaged. A lot of it is still repressed memory. But she remembers that she didn't allow anyone to see her immediately afterwards.

 _Except for..._

Jane hears a jingle of flat metal, and when she looks up she sees a hand outstretched towards her. Jam is looking at her soberly, her hand clasped around something which she has offered to Jane. When Jane doesn't immediately take the gift, Jam shakes her fist in insistence. Jane takes the offering.

It rattles into Jane's cupped palms. Dogtags.

They are scratched and worn, but they are almost readable.

"Those were Marcus'," Jam explains. Jane handles them with the utmost respect, as if the dogtags were made of porcelain instead of metal. This is precious.

This is more than memorabilia. This is a symbol of a lover.

"I want you to have them."

Jane's head snaps up so sharply that the back of her neck cracks. "No way! I couldn't!" she protests, but she sees Jam smiling again. The shop owner shakes her head. Jane insists, "But these are so personal!"

"They belong to a hero. I couldn't think of anyone else that would deserve it more," Jam persists. "You were meant to be here today."

And Detective Jane Rizzoli believes her. She believes her with the quickened beating of her heart and the swelling of pride in her chest. She slips the dogtags over her head. They clink together as they come to rest underneath her folded sunglasses. Then she bows reverently to the shop owner.

"Thanks, Jam," she says hoarsely, like a whispered prayer.

Jam nods her head. They scoop their hands back into the boxes. But then Jam pauses.

"And if you don't like them, I'm sure you'll find someone else worthy of them. Anyone in your life like that?"

Instantly, Jane knows that there is.

* * *

The late afternoon sun casts slightly longer shadows now. Jane slides back behind the wheel of her cruiser, and is just grateful that the day has finally cooled off a bit.

She produces the dogtags. Sees how the numbers have been almost shorn off with the deep scratches gauged into the metal. There is a story behind the uneven markings. One she is sure she will always seek the answer to but never will have.

An eternal mystery.

This is an extremely personal artefact. Upon realising this she is inches away from hopping out of the parked car, striding right back into the shop and handing them back into Janine Ann-Marie Rizzoli's possession.

It would be fruitless though.

Disrespectful.

Jane runs an index fingertip over the numbers, the ones still visible and readable. Maybe she was related to this Marcus Rizzoli. A far off cousin, a third-time removed something or other. Her hand falls to the bulleted scar on her side.

Maybe chaotic bravery runs in Rizzoli blood.

She hangs the dogtags over the rear-view mirror, where they jangle and sway. She slides her sunglasses out from the collar of her shirt and puts them on. Her hands grip the wheel of the unmoving car.

She is aware that she has no idea where she's going.

She could go back to her apartment. But it is still early. Even after an hour of stacking and cataloguing books she feels restless. She doesn't have to go into work until 9. She could go and bug her brother or her mother. Then again, with her parent's pending divorce, she isn't prepared to deal with an evening of family drama.

It hits her that where she instinctively wants to go is see Maura. To excitedly share her experience and findings after her visit to the charity shop. After all, they did make a pact to complete their bucket lists with each other.

Jane turns on the engine when a tap comes to her window, startling her. Jam stands there, smiling apologetically. Jane puts down her window.

"Hey. You left this," Jam explains, holding up Jane's mobile. The detective blinks, and takes the phone. "Someone called Cavanaugh called but I didn't answer."

Jane groans and collapses forward, pressing her forehead to the steering wheel. Hearing Jam's short bark of laughter, she turns her head so that she can look up at the other woman.

"There goes my paperwork free afternoon, no doubt," Jane says dryly, sitting back in her seat and fixing her sunglasses.

"Nasty, slave-driving boss?" Jam suggests.

"You got it," the detective replies. Then gratitude fills the frustrated vacuum of ruined afternoon plans. "Thanks, by the way."

"You're always welcome here, Rizzoli," the other woman says, waving her away.

Pulling the cruiser back out onto the Boston streets, Jane puts the radio on. It isn't something she does often. Either she has her mother talking her ear off or she is listening to her own music.

A harsh British accent and driving guitar melodies assault her. It makes her twitch, but she keeps it on. She remembers this song. It makes her nostalgic for the summer that she entered her final year of the police academy. One of her flatmates played the album on repeat for months.

Involuntarily, she nods her head to the beat as she swings the cruiser around a corner.

She can't count how many emergency stops she has to make because of unattended children running out in front of her. Enjoying the hot summer's day means that safety isn't a priority.

Still, Jane can't get Jam's words out of her head.

" _But you gotta know that sometimes in life, we outta let people be brave for us."_

She feels the top of her sunglasses starting to stick to her forehead. She clicks on the noisy air conditioning. It drowns out the song from her youth. Surprisingly, this irritates her, so Jane twirls the volume dial. The song reverberate around the car.

She grins manically.

Perfect.

Yet her head doesn't stop reminding her of those words. Like a broken record, they skip and repeat and zip and crackle only to repeat all over again.

She clenches her jaw.

Meditate; that's what Maura would do. But she is just too geared up and this song is just _too good_ to turn down and concentrate.

Jane settles for riding out the song on the radio. The last verse holds just as much power over her as the first.

Above her, the dogtags clink, reminding her of their presence again.

" _But you gotta know that sometimes in life, we outta let people be brave for us."_

Jane thinks of Maura; for who else would it be?

Not once, but twice Maura Isles had been there when Jane Rizzoli crumbled. There to pick up the pieces and meticulously put her back together until she was all better again.

The second time her shooting. But the first time, it was Hoyt. Maura was, for a long time after the initial rescue, the only person Jane allowed near her hands.

Yes, Korsak had seen her injuries. Jane grits her teeth as she remembers the photograph her friend and former partner insists on keeping in his desk. It is a captured moment of the time of her greatest weakness, now immortalised.

Lasting forever in a single frame.

But once the initial blood chilling shock had worn off, Jane vehemently refused to let the EMTs attend to her. More lucid, she saw her entrapment as a humiliation, not an act of valour...

 _There are holes in your hands._

 _Not that you can see them. Your hands look like you dipped them straight into a bucket of thick, dark red paint._

 _But you can feel them._

 _You hear a whimper. You're sure it's you._

 _BPD and FBI boots are hammering up and down the rickety wooden staircase of the basement you know you'll be seeing every night for a long time. Every night in your nightmares. No way to escape the horror behind your eyelids._

 _You're trembling all over like a baby lamb without its ewe._

 _Maybe Hoyt should have just finished the job._

 _You won't let anyone near you. Even through the fog of existence, you know you've whimpered and curled further in on yourself at any attempt anyone has made thus far to approach you. You're slumped against the wall._

 _Numb._

 _High heeled clicks break through the boots which thump up and down the stairs. A voice floats down to you through the fog. A voice you trust and adore._

" _She's not letting anyone near her, Vince?"_

 _And through the numbness comes a stirring of affection. Like how a tender purr vibrates a cat's body._

"' _Fraid not, Doctor Isles. I don't know what to do...the paramedics are urging me to get her out because they don't want any more damage done to her hands but any one gets near her and she gets real agitated."_

" _I thought this may be the case. I don't doubt there are some long days ahead of us, Vince..." A heartbeat, and then a deep breath. "Make sure no one is paying attention. This may be highly unethical, but I've prepared for this situation since she was found an hour ago."_

" _What are you ...?"_

 _"Something that, according to all strict medical practise, I shouldn't."_

 _And then-_

 _"But for her I will."_

 _Heels appear in front of you, but your head is hung low and you don't raise it._

 _You're not good enough to raise it._

 _The good doctor kneels._

" _Jane, do you trust me?" she murmurs, so low that no one else in the echoing basement can hear but you._

 _Do you? Of course you do._

 _You think you nod subtly. Because she breathes out in relief._

" _Heaven knows, I should not be doing this." A pause, heady and tense. A battle of wills takes place in someone else's head._

" _Okay. Okay I...I think this should be alright." Another pause, and a softer tone, directed back to you._

" _Trust me now, okay? I'll take care of this. I'll take care of you. Close your eyes."_

 _You do._

 _You feel lips graze your forehead, and then a sharp prick in the side of your neck. You're falling but she catches you and you're gone..._

Jane, bleary eyed and drugged to the hilt, awoke to find a bashful, blushing Dr Isles at her bedside. She found out how Maura, anticipating Jane's agitation, had administered a sedative. When Jane was taken to hospital, Maura was pulled to the side by the paramedics. She was rebuked about ethical practises and administering drugs without proper permission. However, they eventually resigned themselves to the fact the call had been a good one.

Jane could well have caused far more damage to her hands in her protests and fear.

Jane slams her hands against the steering wheel. She hates the vulnerability that she inhibited at that time. Still, Maura was gracious then, as she is now, and has never mentioned it. Jane's heart aches. She should shower Maura with thanks and praise more often.

With the tension in her body draining, it is that thought that stays with Jane. It gets her plotting the whole way to the station.


	5. Save It For The Morning After

Much more Maura and Jane interaction this chapter! Is Jane oblivious to the changing boundaries between them...?

* * *

"What about that one?"

"No."

"Really?!"

"Absolutely not, Jane! The bleeding reds and oranges through the pastel hues would clash so horribly with the shade of my walls!"

Jane shakes her head in disbelief. "I actually like this one!" she cries indignantly, earning herself a dig in the ribs from the doctor.

For the last hour and a half, the two have wandered around the art gallery. They search for some piece that will spark the imagination. And match Maura's decor. But thus far, everything has been lacklustre.

"I don't know how much longer I can handle this," Jane grumbles. "I might just buy you something and get it over with."

Maura continues to ignore her, focusing instead on the canvas bursting with artistic ability. Jane crosses her arms across her chest, glaring at those around her.

"I'm pretty sure my feet have never hurt this much. Ever." She sighs dramatically, fidgeting with her hands. "But this is the depth of my loyalty and self-sacrifice for you. If my feet crack and bleed, so be it."

This does pull a light laugh from Maura, which in turn makes Jane smile. "Stop being dramatic, Jane. We've been here for 87 minutes. Not a lifetime."

"Oh, 87 minutes? Only 87. That makes it perfectly okay then..."

A debonair artist appears at their side, head tilting back and forth. Maura catches Jane staring at her. The bright lights of the gallery cause a white, impregnable glare to sheen the lenses of her glasses. Jane curls her lip and looks away. Maura bites her lip. They continue to stand in uncomfortable silence.

The artist makes an unimpressed noise and glides on to the next piece. The next area was filled with sculptures and Maura explains their significance. Jane retorts that they were just strangely twisted metallic things. Just a money making mess, in her words.

"Maura, what exactly is it that you're looking for?" Jane asks quietly, glancing at her friend carefully. She doesn't speak too much louder than a hoarse whisper now. The deeper they travel into the gallery, the stronger the stagnant, mysterious ambience. The one that always occurs on its own in art galleries.

"I'll know when I see it, Jane. I'm not presumptuous at the best of times and I shall not be now," Maura replies sternly.

Jane breathes slowly out through her nose as they shuffle through an arched entryway. They enter into a darker annex of the gallery.

"That's way too ambiguous for me," she mutters, huffing as she crosses her arms over her chest. She spots a teenage boy smirking at her. He raises his eyebrows as his gaze flicks between herself and the oblivious doctor. He shrugs before returning to his parents, who are heatedly debating the price of a portrait.

Behind her, Maura gasps.

Jane whirls around immediately, her instincts flaring up. Seeing that there's no danger, she catches what has caused the surprised noise to rush out.

In the darker annex, the painting is marvellous.

Its colours are so vivid and its depth so real, that Maura has to try hard not to reach out and stroke it.

It is a depiction of rubble; grey and hard and dead. The details of the dirt and dust and grime are so intricate. It is unfathomable even to one as intelligent as Maura how the artist created them. Splashed over the static grey rubble is bright splotches of red paint; blood. Something she comes into contact with every day and yet has never admired until now. Blood on the pavement; it triggers her instantly.

In the blink of an eye she is sucked down a psychological rabbit hole and into somewhere else.

She is watching Jane's blood seep into the cracks on the sun-bleached concrete.

She has got her eyes glued to her wrist watch and her fingertips pressed into Jane's jugular.

She is listening to the EMTs, giving them the vitals, listening to the cops buzzing and shouting out around her.

And then she's breaking down in the back of an ambulance when the adrenaline slows and she realises that it's _Jane_ on that stretcher with a hole in her stomach.

She shudders back into reality. She almost reaches out to touch Jane, to make sure that this isn't the daydream. But she doesn't. She becomes readjusted and fixated with the painting.

The blood and the rubble aren't what draw her into the painting. In the centre, sprouting up amongst the destruction of the debris and the horror is a single, blooming pink rose.

"Neat, huh?" a voice asks.

Maura whips her head around to her right. A young woman with a shy smile and a bright yellow beanie is also gazing up at the painting. Briefly she glances around at Jane. The detective is more interested in the painting beside it; a bright blue bear riding a toddler's tricycle.

"How does that even...?" Jane mouths to herself, eyebrows raising high on her forehead as she shakes her head from side to side in awe.

Maura smiles, swallows, and turns back to the young woman, lest she be rude. "It is exquisite. The colours, the... imagery...it's frankly quite breath-taking."

The young woman's eyes widen a little, but it is subtle enough that Maura decides she won't think anything of it. Perhaps the young woman has a differing opinion. Again, she wouldn't want to be rude by starting an unnecessary debate in a public gallery with such a substantial crowd.

"I did that," the young woman states, nodding to it. She takes her beanie off of her head, brushes some invisible substance off. The doctor swallows, looking up at the painting, then at the woman and back again.

"That's fantastic. Well, perhaps if I could ask you a few questions about the painting itself?" Maura inquires.

The woman grins, shrugging her shoulders. Maura takes the opportunity to take in the woman in front of her. She cannot be more than twenty five years old. Black skinny jeans with an open leather jacket revealing a band T shirt from a group that Maura does not recognise.

"Are you gonna ask me what it means?" The woman scuffs her boot on the floor, chewing on her thumb for a moment.

Maura nods eagerly. The artist points around the bottom, where the majority of the blood is. "It is a symbol of love amongst destruction, you see? A blooming young rose growing up through rubble following something, uh, really bad. Terrible enough to rip the building down, or whatever it was that happened there."

Maura nods. The artist continues. "There are rusty bloodstains which lie preserved, guarded from the rain underneath the jutting piece of rock, just there, see?"

She indicates where exactly she means. Maura follows the pointed finger intently. "It's kinda unlikely that the rain wouldn't wash away the blood eventually, but it's art, right? I like to think of it as a reminder of the destruction and loss of grief itself. I think it accentuates the message of the rose."

Again, the doctor dumbly nods. She hangs on every word, and the young artist seems to notice this. Suddenly self conscious, she drops her pointed finger back to her side, one hand fixing her hair. "So umm...yeah I guess."

"Hmmm..." Maura hums noncommittally, before turning to fully face the artist. "Is it for sale?"

Any bravado that the artist had drops away. She fiddles with the yellow beanie in her hand. Afraid that she has misheard the other woman. "I-I'm sorry?" she stutters.

Maura tilts her head. "The painting? Is it for sale?"

The artist scrunches the beanie between two white-knuckle fists. "It is, yes."

Maura glances over her shoulder at Jane, still entranced by the bear on the tricycle. It makes her smile fondly. Facing the anxious artist, Maura folds her hands neatly in front of her. "I would like to purchase this painting."

She feels the artist's uneasy eyes inspecting her. She understands that a woman dressed as impeccably and expensively as she does obviously is able to afford a painting like this. But _why_ she would chose this type of art over something that would typically been perceived to have more class is what doesn't quite settle well in the artist's opinion.

Maura softens her features as much as she can. "Let's just say that this painting represents something personal to me," she says calmly. The artist's eye light up. That sentence is what every aspiring artist, creator, painter, sculptor, photographer or composer of any work will always be striving to hear.

"I'll ensure that it's yours by the end of the day," the artist assures her.

As the artist scuttles away, Jane joins Maura at the painting. Despite her enamour with the tricycle riding bear, the tall woman remains thoroughly unimpressed. "Hey. You finally make a decision on this thing or what?"

The doctor only has eyes for the rose, but the sentence holds a lot more weight than what Jane imagines. Maybe she really does mean the painting. But Maura believes that it could apply to what she should do about these new feelings that she harbours for Jane. They are dazzling and terrifying. They excite her and scare her.

Most of all they confuse her.

"Absolutely," she breathes.

Hives enflame her chest.

* * *

"Maura…"

"Jane, honestly, if you'd stop wiggling around like some form of anguilliform, then perhaps I would be able to do this a little more efficiently."

Jane scowls, but closes her eyes again and tries to force herself to relax.

The lanky detective perches on the edge of Maura's bathroom sink. It comes at the doctor's insistence. She doesn't want the face paint to stain any expensive wooden floors or plush carpets. Definitely not the furniture that costs about the same as Jane's rent for at least four months.

Jane can tell that Maura is trying not to laugh at the predicament. Concentrating on her delicate work rather than the fact that her dear friend and colleague is wearing a tiger outfit.

It was Jane's idea. Today is the day that she goes to volunteer at the children's hospice for a few hours. She called in a few favours from some of her friends and work mates. Of course, she fired a few subtle threats not to leak the information to anyone that would make fun of her for it. Now here she is, trying not to twitch or flinch as Maura carefully applies the orange and black stripes onto her cheeks.

"How long are you there today?" Maura asks softly.

"From 1 to 4," Jane replies easily. She closes her eyes as Maura gently sponges more nectar coloured face paint onto her eyelids.

Maura purses her lips, standing back for a second to see what else had to be done. Jane opens her eyes to see Maura's stunned expression.

"What?" Jane asks, her eyes flitting between Maura's wide eyes in concern. "What is it? Do I really look like a complete dork?"

Maura gets flustered, seemingly fighting to return herself to ideas of practicality and reality. "I-I-"

Just as Jane attempts to soothe her, Angela Rizzoli is heard bursting through the door into Maura's kitchen.

"Maura? Jane? Are you here?" comes the shout.

Maura lets her eyes flutter closed for a fraction of a second in a silence. Jane rolls her eyes and slouches down at the sink. Maura reaches out and squeezes her shoulder affectionately until Jane smiles grimly at her. Then she is wearing a gracious smile and leaving for the kitchen.

She turns towards the bathroom mirror, appraising Maura's handiwork. It is impressive to say the least. She grins, and is startled at the appearance of her own white teeth between the black lips. Checking no one is behind her in the doorway, she tests out a low growl. Thinking of how ridiculous she must look, she exits the bathroom and follows in Maura's tracks.

"Hello, Angela." Jane hears Maura greet her mother warmly in the kitchen.

Angela replies equally as fondly. "Hey, Maura. I was just coming round to see if you wanted to catch up over some lunch?"

Jane pauses in the hallway and swivels her eyes up to the ceiling with a scoff. She knows exactly what this is. This is a poorly veiled ulterior motive. What Angela really means is that Jane hasn't been around much in a while. Or she's been working late. What she wants to find out, through Maura's inability to lie, is whether or not something is wrong with her daughter.

Jane Rizzoli is a private woman and ultimately private about the things that matter the most to her. Though she loves her mother dearly, the two aren't nearly as close as Angela would like them to be. Her daughter, to her, is closed off.

And has been to so many in her life.

Until Maura.

"Yes," Maura answers. Jane imagines her schooling her features to conceal the amusement that she feels.

"Great!" Angela cries. Cupboards squeak as she presumably retrieves cups from a high shelf. Jane trots down the remainder of the stairs and makes her way to the kitchen.

"You know," Angela begins."I think it's great that J- Woah!"

A cup smashes onto the tile of Maura's floor as both of Angela's hands go up to her mouth in shock. Maura jumps at the loud crash, and then whirls around to see what caused such a reaction. The doctor has to stifle a giggle.

"Ah, Ma! Look what you did. You broke Maura's mug!" Jane scowls.

She is standing in the doorway her stringy tail waving. She probably seems less than pleased to see her mother. Going by Maura's expression, she is sure the wilted look of her tiger ears only emphasis that.

"Jane! Why on God's good earth are you dressed like a…like a tiger?" Angela cries, gripping the counter for balance.

Jane practically growls at her mother as she stalks towards the coffee table in the living room.

Jane rifles through the bowl on the coffee table as she searches for her keys. "Because, Ma, I'm volunteering at the children's hospital this-"

"Volunteering?!" Angela shrieks, her hands settling on her hips. "Jane Rizzoli volunteering! I never thought I'd see the day. Just wait until Clarence and Maurice here about this!"

Jane groans as she produces her keys with a frustrated jingle. Waving dramatically at Maura, she ignores her mother. "Bye, Maura!" she says wryly.

Maura laughs airily as Jane leaves, her tail flapping up behind her in her wake. "Goodbye, Jane."

Jane catches Maura's eyes just before she leaves through the front door.

And outside, something entirely curious happens. The tops of Jane's cheeks blush. The detective looks down at her feet with a girlish smile on her face. Excitement wiggles in her stomach.

"Let's roar, Rizzoli."

* * *

Maura let her eyes trek around the indie bar.

Interspersed wooden pillars support the low cream ceilings where beams zigzag above her. The place is busy but not suffocating, a merry weekend buzz in the air. The night is still young and the patrons are still sober. It has less of an inviting feel than the Robber, but Maura finds that she likes it here. The anonymity is comforting in its own way.

That being said, any place is better than where the pair have just come from.

The comedy club had been too dank and dark, and possibly rat-infested. The booze was cheap, and the clientèle matched the prices. None of the three acts that had performed were anywhere near funny. They had all been hollered off. Their tails between their legs as they cowered under the assault of stale peanuts and hounding boos. They were under-prepared and utterly pathetic.

Maura loved it.

She was so far out of her comfort zone, and yet it was hard to see if these people even had one to begin with. The comedy club was a peg off of Jane's bucket list. Now here they were to knock another off of Maura's.

The Roebuck hosted live gigs every night. The youth flood at the door to beg the owners for just one night of glory onstage. Everyone filtered in and out of the bar, from the young to the old and the odd. But what any youngster starting a band wanted was to perform on the Roebuck's tiny, badly lit stage.

There was a myth that it would bring good luck; that many bands had attained a recording contract within the year. This, Maura hypothesised, couldn't really be proved. But she was here to listen and be a good sport anyway.

Jane and Maura have missed the first half of the current band's set. The teenage four-piece are retuning their instruments after a fifteen minute break. Maura watches how they handle their gear; the amps and the guitars.

The guitars and kits are battered and taped. It is obvious that each of them have seen better days. Yet they also tell a story of passion and endless nights of practising.

Like a pill dropped into a glass of water, a thought starts to sizzle and dissolve into Maura's mind.

This four-piece clearly approach their passion with just as much dedication as she does. And twice the vigour. She has always considered herself a professional, ranked well above others in the working world. Much higher than a group of unemployed teenagers. But how could she not respect such hard work?

Even before they have struck a chord, Maura knows that she will listen to every lyric. She will clap to every appropriate beat and cheer after every final note. Because no matter whether this band will go on to be Billboard racketeers or whether this is their one and only gig, they deserve it.

Jane appears then. She sets two glasses of wine in front of Maura and then takes a seat. Maura blinks in surprise at Jane's choice of drink.

"You aren't having beer?" Maura asks.

Jane shrugs sheepishly. They both sit with glasses of ruby red wine. It perplexes the blonde, but Jane doesn't address it at all, avoiding an answer completely. "So, you think these little rockers are gonna be any good?"

Maura sighs. _Can't she just answer me properly for once?_

Just then, the static tone of the microphone sheers through the atmosphere. Everyone collectively groans and cover their ears. An embarrassed teenager with shaggy black hair and a tattered black T shirt grins crookedly.

"Sorry 'bout that," he says. Maura smiles. The boy has an English accent for sure. "Um, so yeah here we go again. This song's like, one of my favourites. S'pretty good."

"Not much of a speech maker, is he?" Jane quips, sipping on her glass of wine.

The drummer idly spins one of his sticks around his fingers. He whistles, getting the attention of the bassist, who sniggers at something he says. The bassist hops his way over to the second microphone. "Hey Dodge, tell them what the song's about."

The guitarist ruffles his shaggy black hair. He shrugs his shoulders as the crowd mills around for a better view of the stage. They anticipate the performance.

"It's just... I think it's about like, the media fucking you up and stuff these days. How we're all a bit, I mean, we're all a bit obsessed, aren't we?" he asks, readjusting the guitar strap on his shoulder. "And umm..." He glances sideways at the fourth band member, a girl lightly strumming the strings.

The teenager grins. "If there's someone you wanna hook up with, fuck it. Do it. Leave all your regrets to the morning after, eh?" He steps back, getting his fingers on the right frets before returning to the microphone. "This is Teddy Picker, by the Arctic Monkeys."

The drummer shouts an up tempo count in and then the band begin.

The bar comes alive; the tempo is fast and the riffs are quick to stick. Many are nodding their heads with the beat. The vocals alternate between the cocky bassist and the shaggy haired guitarist. It fascinates Maura how put together they are, how organized. But that is not really what sticks out in her mind.

As the song floats up and around her, she can't get the teenager's words out of her mind. " _If there's someone you wanna hook up with, fuck it. Do it. Leave all your regrets to the morning after, eh?"_

 _No,_ Maura demands adamantly, if only in her mind.

She catches a glimpse of Jane, who is grinning at the shameless teenagers. The glow of the bar lights makes her dark hair glow purple and her face a shade of violet pink. Yet her eyes are as dark and gorgeous as ever as they stay rooted to the stage.

Maura remembers this afternoon, painting Jane's face. When her eyes had opened to see why Maura has stopped, it was like magic. Jane was the tiger. She always has been. Trim muscles, sleek exterior. A burning gaze that would turn hardened criminals to quivering wrecks.

The primal tigress full of energy and drive. Who stalks around suspects in the interrogation room. Who draws out their confessions. Who can jump into the fray without fear of the consequences.

She is Detective Jane Rizzoli, and she is magnificent.

How does Maura even begin to explain the concepts bubbling inside of her? The ones which cause her blood to boil and her flesh to blush red? Thoughts of Jane, of Maura being the prey. Ghost images and feelings flicker over her skin like flames. Being pressed against a wall, hot breath and seductive words in her ear, dexterous hands sliding under her dress and up her thighs…

Maura looks away, crossing her legs and politely placing her hands in her lap. Maura Isles leads her life with her head and not her heart. Spontaneous, satisfying hook up or not. She has no doubt that Jane and she could ignite a passion between the sheets so strong it could strip the paint off of her walls. Yet temptation never leads to anything but a tangle, a mess.

She likes her friendship as it is, thank you very much.

That's what her head says, anyway.

* * *

All the excitement of the night and the consumption of more than a few glasses of wine leads to now. The two women giggling the whole way to Maura's front door. Maura nestled into Jane, the detective's arm protectively held around her shoulders. The taxi cab that Jane rang for a few minutes ago is on its way.

"My blood alcohol level must be...must be..." Maura erupts into another spate of giggles. Jane just nods and wears a silly smile. She like is a teenage boy who is more interested in his date than his evening. Swept up in Maura Isles.

 _Wait, what?_

They stand facing each other on the pathway that leads to Maura's grand house. Jane feels stunned, like she has just been zapped by a taser. Maura is oblivious. She is smiling widely and everything about her is pure and golden in the streetlight.

She is perfection.

They are almost toe to toe. Not close enough for discomfort, but not far enough that it wouldn't be easy enough to lean down. To tilt her head to the side and...

 _Oh God._

 _Oh God no._

"I had a really good day today, Jane. And this evening was the most fun I've had in a long time. Thank you," Maura says quietly, her voice hoarse from an evening of laughter. "Text me when you're home safe."

Jane swallows. She's numb. She feels like she can't speak. Like her jaw muscles have been tightened and she'll never utter another word again.

Maura doesn't notice, or if she does she doesn't show it. She just squeezes the fleshy indent of Jane's elbow once. Then she heads up to her front door, not looking back until she's safely inside. She waves once, then she's gone.

Jane isn't sure how long she stands there. But she is startled by the cab's horn. As if emerging from a trance, she stumbles towards it. She shoves her hands into her pockets.

Lumbering into the cab, Jane imagines that Maura lies in bed that night and dreams. She dreams about autopsies and arrows; and the age old rhythm that lovers do. Then, maybe, she dreams of arrows through hearts and cherubs and Jane.

Jane gets through her apartment door, texts Maura, pulls off her shoes and pants and then flops backwards onto her bed.

But she can't sleep very well at all.

She stares at the ceiling. All the drowsiness from her earlier drinking gone. Replaced with the sensation of ice cold water being tipped over her body. Over and over, her eyes trace the blades of her ceiling fan in the darkness, thinking about Maura.

Thinking about tonight. Even as they sat in a dingy bar that would never be good enough for Maura's standards, with Jane she was unrestrained. She laughed just as Jane laughed; bent over double at the waist. Maybe clutching a table or each other as their bodies shook. Clinking their glasses together as they toasted to a whole manner of things.

And Jane's chest constricts as she remembers the ending of the night.

It felt like a date.

She rolls over and buries her face in her pillow, letting out a low, painful sound. It felt like a date and it felt like just as Maura left her to go inside, they should have kissed.

She should have kissed her.

But why? This was Maura! This was her best friend! Why would she ever feel the need to kiss her best friend?

It kept her up most of the night. The phantom lips on hers. The soul that lay just under the surface of every single movement, look, calculation and thought of Maura Isles. How she laid herself so bare for Jane to see. The trust, the devotion, the compassion; the love. The absolute adoration that they shared for each other.

By the time she finally found sleep, dawn was breaking.


	6. A Heavenly Way To Die

_I would like to raise one point about the last chapter due to a pm I received; the title was a little misleading, as was the song itself. The whole 'hook-up' culture thing was something I threw in for fun, to link the chapter with a lyric-based title, but actually the original meaning that the teenager gives for the song is more accurate in regards to the song Teddy Picker. The song itself, if you listen to it and take it in the context of the Arctic Monkeys at that point in their career, is a frustration-piece on celebrity status and getting 'teddy-pickered'._

 _Anyway, hope you enjoy this one!_

* * *

 _A week later_

When the first stone pings off of her window frame and startles her awake, Maura believes that she imagined it. Then she hears the second.

She wearily blinks and checks the time; 2:52am. Far too late to have visitors. Yet someone is throwing stones at her bedroom window like some juvenile in love for the first time.

Wiggling her feet into slippers, she frowns as a third pebble pings against her glass. This may be some love struck teenager who has the wrong residence, but did they really have no respect for property?

Brushing aside the curtain and opening the window to lean out into the night, Maura is about to speak when she stops short.

"Jane?!" Maura hisses, making sure that she is seeing properly. "What on earth...?"

Sure enough, the homicide detective has her blazer slung over one shoulder as she sways on her feet. She leans against a brick wall that runs the perimeter of Maura's house as she gazes up at her friend, a silly grin plastered on her face.

"Hey Maura! Maura, hey! D'ya see me?" Jane calls, her voice slurred and her accent coming on much stronger. She totters some way to her left as she excitedly bounces on the balls of her feet. "Huh? Do ya? Hey, Maura, whatta ya doin' all the way up there?"

Maura is slack jawed, unable to respond as she processes what she is witnessing. "Jane, are you intoxicated?"

"What's that?" Jane veers a little to the right, but steadies herself by bracing a hand on the brick wall. "Woah, sorry there, buddy." She pats the brick in apology.

Maura pinches the bridge of her nose, turning inside of the bedroom to get grounded. She feels all sorts of procedures and courses of action readying themselves to be carried out. But the need to pause and laugh until her stomach aches seems to overpower that.

Though she does try to fight it back, an unmovable smile lights up her face.

She returns to the window. "Jane," she calls down. The detective is staring at the ground, supposedly concentrating on not toppling over. "Jane, are you drunk?"

Jane's head snaps up. "No!" she indignantly defends. Maura rolls her eyes. Why did she even ask?

No drunk person ever admits to being drunk.

"Jane, stay there. I'm coming down-"

This agitates Jane, who fiercely shakes her head. "No, no, no, wait! I gotta do somethin'... do a thing first."

From the way that Jane bends into herself, Maura cringes and expected the woman to vomit all over the rose garden. The very one she had trimmed and rearranged just two days ago. But Jane doesn't, straightening up after a moment.

"I heard a song and...uh...thought of Maura...you, Maura. I thought of you..." she says, as bashfully as a drunken Jane Rizzoli could. She looks like a proud kindergarten kid with a finger painting to show to her parents.

Maura's heart thumps in her chest, as if egging her on to ask what the song is. Still, the implications and consequences of such an outcome are so tremendous. So varied and game-changing that she isn't prepared to deal with them. She isn't ready, if indeed she ever will be, to deal with the risk.

Although, in the end, she doesn't even need to ask. Jane starts to sing to her anyway.

"Take me out, tonight. Where there's music and there's people..."

Jane keeps on going. The acapella melody drifts in and out of tune. There are muffled, half-forgotten sections which are skimmed past. Maura feels herself relaxing, even _enjoying_ the drunken serenade.

She doesn't know the song. Has never heard Jane even hum it before, but it seems to be so sincere. So unapologetic and passionate. It means more to her than any mass production symphony or professionally performed ballet.

She leans forward with her elbows on the windowsill and her hands draped casually one over the other. Maura Isles doesn't care if Jane wakes the neighbours.

In fact she almost _wants_ her to.

Maybe they too would see what she sees. Not a drunken detective. Pure, raw Jane Rizzoli, and the undefined bond that she has with the woman at the window.

Briefly she indulges in her attraction to Jane. She wonders why Jane, in her alcohol-induced haze, felt it so urgent to come to Maura's house. In the small hours of the morning, how come she thought it vital to come just to sing her devotion through an honest, if dodgy, song.

Maura thinks that this must have been what Juliet felt like as Romeo climbed up the vines just to recite to her his love.

"To die by your side is such a heavenly way to die..." Jane finishes, repeating the line quietly even when she has completed the song itself.

Maura ponders that statement. It is only a lyric, but since Jane's shooting it is one that she finds that she relates to. It ripples through the air long after Jane has fallen silent and strikes a chord low in Maura's stomach.

 _How about that? Side by side on the autopsy tables, fingers still entwined. Closed eyed, white faced, ethereal. Perhaps the faintest traces of blood crusted on a forehead or under a nostril. Wrists limp but hands still joined-_

She centres herself back into the present. Jane staggers below her, having lost her balance and stumbled forward. Maura eyes her warily.

"Jane, I'm coming down to get you," Maura says. "Stay there and...try not to fall over into the roses."

Ignoring Jane's groan of protest Maura spins on her heel and puts on her dressing gown before starting down the stairs. She turns on the lights in the living room and kitchen. She makes sure to retrieve a bucket from under the sink before going to the front door.

Sauntering around the path that weaves throughout her garden, she spots Jane slumped against the side of the house. The appearance of Maura perks Jane up.

"Maura! You're here!" She pauses, her eyes squinting in confusion. "Whatta ya doing here?"

Maura smiles wryly, holding out her hand to encourage Jane forward. "Come on, sweetie. Time for bed," she says brightly.

"Bed? No!" Jane complains. She pouts like a disgruntled child but obediently takes Maura's hand. She allows herself to be led towards the front door.

On the way there, Jane's boot catches on something and she trips, colliding bodily with Maura. Luckily, the two remains standing. Maura slings Jane's arm over her shoulder, supporting the tall woman. She hopes to avoid sending them both tumbling to the ground. The warmth of Jane's body pressed against her causes Maura to involuntarily blush.

 _Stupid chemical reactions in my bloodstream triggered by the proximity to such a...lovely woman._

Maura yawns as she props Jane against a wall, hands her the bucket and locks her front door. Jane eyes the bucket suspiciously.

"What's this for?" she grumbles.

"That is for if and when you feel the urge to disgorge the lining of your stomach and all of its contents," Maura replies pointedly, leading an unsteady Jane into the kitchen.

She deposits the drunk woman against the kitchen island. Moving to skirt around the island, Maura hears the bucket clatter to the floor. Jane is looking at her hands in wonder, as if she can't imagine how on earth they could have allowed the bucket to fall. Sighing, Maura scoops the bucket up and sets it on the marble counter.

Jane's glassy eyes lazily follow Maura around the kitchen. Then they fall to the glass of water and two white pills which appear in front of her. Maura rounds the island, rubbing between Jane's shoulder blades.

"You'll feel better late if you take these now," she insists.

Jane hesitates, but then shoves both tablets into her mouth and sloppily gulps the water. Maura instantly becomes alarmed and rushes to grab a cloth to wipe up the spillage.

Once done, Jane slumps forward, her knees close to buckling inwards. Maura slips her arm around her waist and helps her towards the living room.

"We dancing, Maura?" Jane slurs suggestively. The stench of vodka clinging to Jane's hair and clothes is unbearable.

"We've always been dancing, Jane," Maura mutters, inching them around the couch. She curses the loose way the words fall out of her mouth. Relief blooms in her chest that Jane is completely out of it.

"Embrace me, you're so embraceable you..." Jane sings huskily, clumsily pulling Maura's body closer to her and trying to shuffle out a few slow-dance steps.

"Jane," Maura laughs. "Come on."

"Maura...you're so embraceable you," Jane murmurs, her vodka-laced breath puffing against the sensitive shell of the smaller woman's ear.

Eventually, Jane flops down onto the couch. Maura spies her blazer left hanging haphazardly over one of the stools at the island. She takes the bucket from Jane, who only gives it up begrudgingly and huffs in protest, and sets it on her floor.

Tucking her hair behind her ear, Maura kneels and slides her hands around one of Jane's ankles, unzipping her boot and pulling it off. Dumbly, Jane lets her do it, both of her hands limp at her sides. Maura repeats the act with the remaining foot.

Taking a deep breath, Maura looks up. She feels pinned under a dark stare. It doesn't waver. It doesn't blink. Maura's heart is in her mouth. Her face heats. In a single moment of intensity, Maura believes Jane to be completely sober, but possessed.

Overtaken by something that is immense and predatory and about to pounce or strike.

Maura's gut squeezes in anticipation at the dark stare.

But all is lost as Jane's stomach gurgles and the woman whimpers, her head lolling to the back of the couch.

 _What are you trying to achieve, Maura Dorothea Isles?_ Maura berates herself, taking a heavy gun and badge from Jane's belt and placing them behind her on the coffee table.

She stands and dusts off her knees, tightening the tie on her robe. Jane raises her head, which ostensibly requires a huge amount of effort.

"There is...there is a light and it never goes out, Maura," Jane whispers seriously.

Maura pats her knee sympathetically. "I understand, Jane. I'm sure there is."

Maura doesn't analyse it, or hypothesis it. Though the scientist inside of her does want to. She assesses Jane's position, sprawled on her couch, and then leaves in search of blankets and a spare pillow.

Jane has passed out cold by the time she comes back.

Setting down her burden, Maura grits her teeth and traces her eyes up to the ceiling. She has to strip Jane of her work clothes. It is theoretically an easier task with Jane unconscious. Maura is sure that Jane would give her more grief if she were awake.

That being said, Maura's problem is the toned, tan skin she is sure to find under those clothes. Already struggling with the feelings she has, Maura is reluctant to add fuel to the fire inside of her. To add reality to the fantasies that she tries not to crave more and more each day.

She freezes; a reddish, brown stain mars Jane's shirt low on her torso. With the precision that only comes from years of skilled experience and perfectionism, Maura delicately inspects the stain. At first, she panics that it may be blood, but one whiff of the stain tells her that it is only ketchup. She relaxes.

"Professional, Dr Isles. You are a professional," she states defiantly, reaching for the top button on Jane's shirt.

Tell that to her imagination.

* * *

Is she going to vomit?

 _No...you aren't...you will not...no..._

Well, that's what her mind says. Her stomach on the other hand...

Jane whimpers.

Her internal organs currently feel as if they have been cleaved and mashed up. Scrambled around and thrown back inside of her in any old tangle. Her head is a throbbing mass, heavy as lead on her neck as she tries to tentatively raise it from the pillow.

If she could crack open her skull and scoop her brain out right this minute, there wouldn't be any hesitation.

She winces when she tries to open her eyelids, her palms pressing right into her eye sockets. She grits her teeth and jams the pads of her thumbs into her temple.

"You know, the British have a slang word for being very blatantly intoxicated," a voice lilts. The crackling of a crisp newspaper page turning breaks up her statement. "Would you like to guess what it is?"

On Maura's sofa, Jane's stomach guzzles and the detective's body seizes. She curls on her side and plunges her face further into the pillow with a painful moan.

Jane imagines Maura behind her. Sitting with her legs crossed at the kitchen island. Reading an article in the newspaper that she went out specifically this morning to buy. She just further coils her body on her couch.

When some moments of expectant silence pass, Jane takes a shaky inhale. She braces herself before prying open one eye. Surprisingly, the living room is still reasonably gloomy and dark. When she rubs some sleep out of her eye, she sees that it is because Maura mercifully kept the drapes and curtains closed on all of the windows.

The watch on her coffee table tells her that it is past noon. It wakes her up faster than any cup of cheap instant coffee.

She bolts up, ignoring how the room tips and spins as she tears the blankets off of her.

"Shit!" Jane hisses, stumbling to her feet. "Shit, I'm so late, I'm- Cavanaugh is going to kill me-"

"No, he isn't," Maura replies calmly, not even looking away from her paper as she flicks another page with ease.

Jane squints her eyes. "What?"

Maura sighs, but continues to skim read the page in front of her. "When I realised that you would be in no fit state to come in to work today, I called in sick for us both. It transpires that you have quite a lot of vacation time stored up."

Jane is stumped. She wants to protest, but her chest is absent of any fiery indignation. Instead, she raises her chin, thinks better of it, and drops her head to her chest. Her brain could well be melting inside of her skull, sloshing around with every movement.

"Guess I was a real mess last night, huh?" Jane says dryly.

She then notices the blankets. The pillow. The fact that the drapes remained closed so that they wouldn't bother her and so that she could sleep it off. The neatly folded stack of clothes from last night on the arm chair. The pint glass of water and tablets waiting for her. The silky pyjamas she wears. Fresh from the cupboard no doubt, just to be thrown on a drunken fool.

Guiltily, Jane wrangles her hands at her sides. "Thanks, Maura," she says sincerely.

Finally, Maura's gaze leaves the paper. She furrows her brow. "Why?"

Jane stands. Immediately, her stomach lurches. She has to loosely hold the bottom of her neck to avoid the flood of nausea thudding in her bloodstream from making her vomit.

 _Disorientation is a bitch._

Jane shuffles her way over to the island. Tossing back the two pills, she chases them down with fast, sloppy gulps of the water. It is breathtakingly refreshing.

With a short gasp, she puts the glass down on the island and steadies herself against it. Then, when the kitchen returns to its motionless state and she regains her equilibrium, she shoots a cheeky smirk Maura's way.

"So, this word. What is it?" Jane rasps.

Maura clucks her tongue on the roof of her mouth, then folds up her newspaper and clasps her hands neatly on top of it.

"Legless. You were absolutely legless last night," Maura says, nodding seriously.

Jane grimaces. "Please, please, tell me I didn't do anything terrible last night."

Maura clicks her nails against the countertop. She tips her head in that way that makes Jane's heart slam into her ribcage.

"Well, you drunkenly serenaded me, proceeded to try and slow dance with me..."

"We slow danced?"

"We tried to."

"Oh, God...continue."

"Then," Maura says pointedly, "You fell unconscious on my couch, when we eventually managed to get you situated on it. After redressing you in my pyjamas, I retired to bed."

Jane runs her hand through her hair, and freezes. Carefully, she extracts her hand, glaring at it in disgust. Pinched between her forefingers and her thumb is a stray peanut. Shuddering, she makes her way to the garbage can, holding it out from her body as if she were afraid it would bite.

"That's not so bed, I guess? Well, if I could remember how I got here in the first place..."

"Of course, I was sleeping maybe forty minutes when I awoke to you retching up the contents of your stomach," Maura adds casually. "Needless to say, the bucket and its property were taken care of and disposed."

"Aw, Maura," Jane murmurs, reaching for her friend's hand and squeezing it. "Thank you for taking care of me. I mean, I feel like crap warmed up, but it could have been a lot worse."

The doctor shakes her head dismissively. "You're my best friend, Jane. Of course I'll look after you if you need me to."

The detective slips the tip of her finger around the edge of the pint glass. She contemplates another gulp of the gloriously cool water when she tilts her head and asks, "If I drunkenly serenaded you, how did I manage to not wake up my mother?"

Maura's eyes lights up with glee. "Oh, you did. She barged through my kitchen door this morning demanding to know why her daughter was yelling the Smiths at the top of her lungs in the middle of the night. You, of course, slept through that. Snoring, I might add."

Jane guffaws. "My ma knows who the Smiths are? I mean, it's the Smiths! Wow, I..." She pulls up short. Her eyes widen and she is jilted upright by some unseen force. "The Smiths...Oh God..."

Maura's concern washes over her like melting snow dripping down her spine. She just about stops herself from reaching out to Jane. "What is it?"

Jane is about to collapse, or at least that is what her buckling knees feel like. She grips the counter. Her eyes search it rapidly as if the clear, cool marble surface could save her from the shock of her memories. "I think...I think I remember what happened last night?"

"Is it...is it bad?" Maura whispers, eyes darting around Jane's face.

Hearing the tone in her friend's voice, Jane looks over. She sees the sober, but alert expression on Maura's face. She breaks into a self-deprecating smile. "Relax, Maura. It isn't like that... there were no roofies slipped to me or anything. You would have known."

Jane watches as Maura's relief makes her appear suddenly languid. Like she could stretch out over the counter top in front of Jane and sleep with the effect that it has on her brain. It is a sensation Jane is all too familiar with.

"So?"

Jane licks her dry lips. Hurriedly, she grabs the glass and greedily slurps down the last of the water before saying,

"I think it's safe to say that all of my bar-related activities on the bucketlist are totally completed."

The doctor splutters. "Even the karaoke?"

Jane's eyes swivel up to the ceiling, her cheeks reddening in embarrassment as the hazy memories drift back to her.

 _The Smiths_.

" _Especially_ the karaoke, Maura."

* * *

Jane is whistling as she switches off the key and kills her engine. The car shudders and stills. She puts up her visor and gets out of the car. All the while she whistles a melody that she remembers only from her father. When he would whistle it every night as he came in from his day of work.

She jogs up the path and steps of Maura's house, shifting from foot to foot as she considers whether or not to knock. Of course, then she recalls that the takeout she got them is still in the car.

Sighing and slumping her shoulders, Jane totters back to her car, retrieving the food. Then she returns to the door step. Without another moment of hesitation, she peddles on through the door of the house.

And immediately stops.

Moaning and slaps of skin are the sounds which greet her at the door.

 _Oh my god. Oh my god. Ohmygodohmygodohmygo-_

" _Fuck me harder, oh yes, oh shit-"_

The voice makes Jane's stomach churn, and she braces her friend hand against the wall. Robotically her feet move, without her permission. She doesn't want to move, she doesn't want to see. She wonders if this is disgust or fear. She concludes it is both.

But when she rounds the corner, she doesn't see two naked people in any kind of sexual positions. She sees the Chief Medical Examiner in silk pyjamas, sprawled out on the sofa with the laptop on her knee. It seems like a normal scene after a long day of work.

Except that Dr. Maura Isles is watching porn.

A grown woman, a city-renowned professional with wealth and influence dripping from her family name, is lying completely relaxed on her couch. Jane's eyes bulge.

Smirking now, Jane walks in, food in hand. "Hola, Dr Isles."

Maura jump sat the voice. "Jane!" she squeals, sounding more like Jane's mother than her best friend. She slams down the laptop lid, silencing the scene.

Jane tilts her head, feigning innocence. "What? Something wrong?"

"I-well- dammit," Maura mutters. She lifts her laptop and sets it gently on the coffee table as she stands, brushing down her pyjamas. "I thought I was being discreet."

"Mmm," Jane hums noncommittally, taking the bag to the island.

"I was!" Maura cries defensively, following Jane. "It was a curiosity. Frankly, I don't understand what all the fuss is about. The depiction of intercourse on the screen bares very little resemblance to sex in reality."

"Uh-huh," Jane mutters, unconvinced. She raises an eyebrow at Maura and begins lifting the tin containers out onto the island. "Maybe that will finally teach you to lock your doors, hmm?"

Maura totters to the cupboard, lifting out two plates and then going for their cutlery. "Did you know, the US porn industry generates $13 Billion in annual revenue?" She watches Jane carefully as the detective dishes out their meal.

Jane swings her leg over the stool closest to her, scuttling it closer to the island before mashing her rice down with her fork. "Really? That's a lot of jerking off, even in a year."

Maura looks as if she wants to respond but instead sits down on her own stool, pulling her plate towards her. They share a comfortable silence for a few moments.

Jane pokes the end of her fork through her rice for a moment, deep in thought. She glances at Maura, who also seems to have lines of thought barraging her.

"So, did you decide what rally thing you wanted to go to?" Jane asks.

Maura meets her eyes, and then sets her fork down. She wipes her mouth with a napkin, and then turns as if to get her laptop, but stops herself. from the twitching expression on her face, Jane reckons she has just remembered the explicit content it was displaying only a few minutes ago. Maura blushes. Jane grins knowingly.

Maura clears her throat, picking up her fork again. "I did. In fact, I think you might find it an interesting experience."

Jane rolls her eyes. "Why did I agree to do this with you?" She stabs at the food on her plate. She ignores the glare she receives from the doctor.

" _Anyway_ , I decided that perhaps we should attend the rally next week in Greendale Plaza. It is expected to have quite a gathering."

"Oh," Jane mutters, slipping from her stool in order to get them both a drink. "What's it for?"

"Oh, it's an LGBTAQ meeting. I've never been to one before, though I have supported charities affiliated with the movement for years," Maura answers.

Jane frowns as she turns on the tap and pours them both water. "LGBTWHAT?"

Maura glances up at Jane, rolling her eyes at the spelling of the extra letters. "It stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender-"

"Woah!" Jane huffs, bringing the water over to the island and retaking her seat. "I get the general theme here. What is it for?"

Maura readjusts herself on her stool. "It is a solidarity protest with the rise of hate crime in other parts of the country."

"Cool. Nice choice," Jane muses. "Aren't you worried that someone is gonna notice the Chief Medical Examiner for the Commonwealth at a political rally?"

Maura shrugs nonchalantly, but when she looks up at Jane, there's a mischievous glimmer in her eye. "Perhaps. I'm not sure I care. In fact, the idea is quite exciting to me."

Jane lets out a gruff laugh through another mouthful of food. She shakes her head as she swallows. "Well, we all get our kicks in different ways, I guess."

After that, the evening is filled with laughter and not much else.


	7. Let Me Give You My Love

_Hey guys! Thanks a million to all of you who are reading, reviewing and following this! One question; why did a few of you think that Jane had completed her bucketlist? She said she had done the **bar related** portion of her list, not the entire thing. If you need any refreshing on the lists just go back to the prologue and read them both. Also, warning for this chapter- Maura's dream is a little cryptic but hopefully you enjoy it._

 _drop me a lin,e tell me what you think. Thanks._

* * *

There is something about being part of a group that never fails to start Maura's heart racing in her chest.

For most of her life, she's never been included in anything. Always excluded. Always the freak, the loner, the nerd, the weird kid.

So standing deep into an electrified crowd on a Saturday evening in late summer is nothing but an absolute ecstasy. Unadulterated, undiluted glee seeps into her bloodstream. Making her stomach a swirling black hole.

And she isn't alone. Jane stands shoulder to shoulder with her, sunglasses on top of her head as she idly eyes her way around the crowd.

Rainbow blurs her periphery vision in every direction; flags and banners hoisted high. The atmosphere is exhilarating. Some sing with mighty gusto and will do so, Maura can tell, until their voices give out. Others grin maniacally and chat amongst themselves. Personally, Maura hasn't stopped smiling since they got into the car.

Seeing that Jane isn't nearly as enthused as she, a sinking feeling settles itself awkwardly in Maura's chest.

"You aren't enjoying yourself?" Maura asks in a concerned tone, eyes flitting around Jane's face as she turns towards her. "Would you like to return home?"

Jane's eyebrows furrow. "No. I'm fine. Just don't know what to expect, is all."

Maura wrings her hands by her hips, glancing up at the makeshift platform. It is currently vacant, but will soon be filled by whoever is intending to address the crowd. "There's still time to leave if-"

"Maura, relax," Jane placates, letting a hand alight on the other woman's shoulder. A smile cracks across her face. "We aren't going anywhere. You wanted to come, so we came."

Maura smiles weakly in response, but all of her previous enchantment has faded away. Guilty pangs linger inside of Jane. "Hey, it could be worse. We could be at that socialist thing you originally thought about."

It is then that they notice a man snaking his way through the crowd towards them. His face is brightly coloured with paint. With such a vivid rainbow, it was almost impossible to tell what his normal facial features would look like. He is beaming as he stops in front of them, holding a large box.

"Free button badges," he offers.

The pair look at each other in amusement before digging their hands deep into the cardboard box. The sea of badges rattle for a second, and then Maura produces two badges. She tilts her head to read them. One is simply a rainbow heart with a white background. The other is just black text; _Do I look straight to you?_

A deep chuckle from the man pulls her attention away from her badges. She glances at the man to find the source of humour.

It is Jane's perplexed expression as she glares at the badges cupped in her hands. The left is frank; the red button with pale pink parallel stripes signifying marriage equality. The one in her right, the one that she is scowling at, is ironic enough that Maura has to cover her mouth with her hand to stifle her laugh.

The large white badge has five cartoons, each one a small character from the Village People. The blue text underneath reads; _The cop was definitely the gay one._

"Oh Jane, I'm sure it wasn't on purpose." Maura whispers, trying not to continue her mirth at Jane's unforgiving stare. It causes a bubble of affection to form in her doctor's chest, and she rubs between Jane's hunched shoulder blades.

Seeing the vendor's curious gaze, Maura smiles. "Jane is a detective," she says by way of explanation.

The vendor nods, impressed. "Well, I'm sure it wasn't personal. Besides, it was the biker that was really gay."

Through speakers at the fore of the platform, a popular song floats into the air. Its tinny sound proves to be a little ridiculous to Maura, who screws in her nose in disapproval.

The vendor notices her distain. "Ugh, I know. My husband chose the playlist," he grumbles, and then gestures to an elaborately dressed group of individuals. "That diva over there in the golden gown is my husband, Jack. Or as he's better known in these circles, Crystal Star."

As if knowing he is being talked about, Jack turns his head. Jane's eyes are fixed on him; golden wig, sparkling dress, mighty heels. Jane Rizzoli is a tall woman, but Jack would clearly tower over her.

And his eyeliner is clearly far more on point than in her wildest dreams.

Jack gives his husband a waggle of his fingers. The vendor returns the wave.

"I like his hair," Jane says dryly.

Maura is still listening to the sound blasting from the stage loudspeakers. Some excited young men and women around her have raised their hands into the air and are singing unabashedly along.

The vendor turns his attention back to the two women in front of him. His smile is sweet without being false.

"You two make such a beautiful couple," he assures.

Maura chokes on her tongue, readying herself to whole-heartedly refute the statement. Then an arm is slipped easily around her waist with a breathy laugh. It falls around her like a warm blanket.

"Thanks," Jane replies. Like he has told her something she has heard one thousand times yet will never tire of.

Maura feels drowsy; the opposite of what she would expect. No shock. No acute, moral dilemma. It's a lie. They aren't together like the vendor has insinuated. But the hairs on Maura's arms and the back of her neck stand on end and she's in no condition to set the record straight.

She can't deny she'd love it to be the truth.

She doesn't even feel hives appear.

"Well, I wish you all the best for the future. Maybe I'll get you again at one of these," he offers, backing away into the crowd. He flashes a smile and then turns his back to them.

Jane is grinning. Maura is stunned. There is still an arm around her waist.

That is where it remains, unchallenged and undisturbed, for most of the rally. It is taken away only when Jane has to stop down and retie her shoelaces.

There is an absence for a minute. A tense minute where words come from Maura's mouth but she can't hear them with her heartbeat thumping in her ears.

Then a sly, unsure hand nudges hers, their knuckles brushing. And hands entwine.

 _We are fitting in with this crowd,_ they both think.

 _This is comfortable._

 _This is no big deal._

Yet both of them know they are in big trouble.

* * *

When Jo Friday is frightened by something, her whole body quivers. Shakes like it has a rolling ball of pure electricity. Something that wouldn't ever stop.

That is exactly how Maura is as she sits beside Jane. Trembling in the seat as the metal barrier is cranked down around them. The doctor is out of her depth; eyes darting, lightly perspiring, pulse out of control. Her chest rises and falls in sharp, panicked breaths.

Jane leans over, purposely brushing her lips over Maura's ear. "Relax," she murmurs. "I won't let anything happen to you that you don't want. You'll be okay."

And then-

"Trust me."

Maura believes Jane. Trusts her with every cell inside of her. Trust her even when the rollercoaster lurches and begins trundling forward. The large loops and twirling twists had looked so impressive when they first entered the fairground gates.

Maura could not say the same now.

Desperately, she pleads with her common sense; the two of them are grown women. She is a professional, after all. She has faced far greater demons than this. And she could rhyme off the statistics about rollercoasters and related fatalities until the cows come home, and then even longer.

Maybe even until the cows buy tickets and ride the rollercoaster themselves.

It is a hard notion to focus on, however, as they surge steeply upwards. Then they tumble down to the left so sharply that Maura's hands slam down on the protective metal bar.

For the next nauseating four and a half minutes, Maura Isles feels brutally born again. She is rammed and held back in her seat, her hair gusting around her head as the air pressure assaults her face.

Faintly, as if far away in the distance, she can hear blood-curdling screaming intermingling with the whoops and cackles of euphoric joy. Yet she is sure that she does not make any sound above a whimper; her jaw locked since the first spiralling loop.

Air hisses constantly past her ears. It is so deafening that when the brakes screech and scratch at the metals rails to bring the rollercoaster to a final jilting rest position, Maura doesn't hear Jane say her name.

Her ears just keep ringing.

Letting out a long, deep breath, Jane looks over at her best friend. The barrier goes up.

"Jesus, Maura. You look traumatised."

Her hair is a swept mess, her eyes wide and unseeing. Her skin is sickly pale, the colour of the bodies on her autopsy table. As Maura sits there staring vacantly, she briefly wonders if she appears catatonic.

"Maura," Jane cautiously repeats, gingerly shaking her friend's shoulder. "Are you gonna throw up?"

Her lucidity seeping back in drips and drabs, Maura sniffs and blinks and registers the fact that she is still sitting in the ride.

She reaches with a trembling hand towards Jane, almost missing because her nerves are shot. Maybe she'll never perform a precision-packed autopsy every again.

Graciously, Jane aids Maura in climbing up to the platform, where she promptly falls into her.

"Woah, Doctor Isles," Jane laughs, securing Maura in her arms as she stabilises herself.

Maura's eyes are watering from the harsh bite of air that whipped at them as they shot around the track in the rollercoaster. Jane guides them over to a bench, and sits them down carefully. The fog dissipates around Maura, but she still looks pale when she manages to speak again.

"That was….an experience," she breathes, her throat constricting. Her stomach still feels weightless, fluttering somewhere up in the centre of her ribcage along with her heart.

Jane smiles smugly. "So what's your prognosis, doctor?"

Maura's eyes shut and she breathes through her nose, her head spinning still. "I'm still unsure if I can…if I'd be safe to put my feet on the ground and walk independent of your help."

"Really? You don't want a round two then?"

Maura's eyes open and zip to Jane's in alarm. "No!"

Jane half-stands. "You sure? I could get us another set of tickets…"

A hand clamps down on her arm and yanks her back into a seated position. Jane's chest shakes with laughter as she nudges her friend's shoulder. She pats her hand sympathetically.

"I'm kidding, Maur," Jane says. Then she glances at a girl who skips past with a fluffy pink monstrosity in her hand. "Hey, you want some cotton candy?"

Maura's eyes follow the back of the little girl with the bright pink treat as she weaves through the fairground and away from them. "I-I'm not sure-"

"Ah, come on Maura! What's a trip to the fairground without cotton candy?" Jane complains lightly, turning to face Maura more fully on the bench.

Just then, a shrill ring calls out from Jane's pocket. Wriggling her hips and stuffing her hand into her jean pocket, Jane pulls out her phone and scowls at the caller ID.

"What on earth could Angela Rizzoli possibly want now?" she laments, looking as if she is contemplating throwing the phone into the nearest trash can.

Maura smiles and pats Jane's knee. "You should answer that."

Jane frowns at the screen. "But…"

"It's your mother, Jane," Maura says, standing up. "You answer and make sure everything is okay, and I will go buy us some of that…sugary fluff that you seem to believe is such an _iconic_ American treat."

Jane mouths a thank you and winks at her friend before answering the phone. Daunted at the crowds of over-excited, sugar-fuelled children, Maura almost sits back on the bench and tells Jane to forget about it. But she doesn't. She presses her lips together in a thin, determined line and sets off towards the bright red stand across the trail.

The vendor has his face resting on the palm of his hand, his eyes heavily lidded and wearily lines on his face. A Red Sox cap is pulled down low, as if warning customers against disturbing him. But Maura is undeterred.

She clears her throat.

He cracks a single eye open, like a lazy dog on a hot summer's day. His gaze appraises Maura in a way that makes her skin crawl.

"Well hello pretty girl," he drawls, his evidently Southern accent making her insides quiver with the need to escape his stare. "Can I getcha somethin'?"

Maura wants to politely decline and go back to the comfort of Jane's presence, but she knows she can't. How pathetic would she be to Jane if she did?

She clears her throat, her pulse quickens. "I'd like some cotton candy, please?"

He doesn't move to get it. His grin only widens. His teeth are the colour of mustard long past its sell-by date.

"Ah, ya do, do ya?" he asks, leering forward with his elbows on the counter.

Reflexively, she steps back. "Y-yes. Two, umm, portions please."

His tongue curls up over the yellow teeth. She is grateful that she isn't close enough to smell his breath. She is sure it is repugnant.

"No problem, little miss. Gotta warn ya though, no cotton candy in this town or any in the fifty states would ever be as sweet as you," he growls, huffing out deep husks at his own jokes.

Maura's hands clench at her sides. _Is he making fun of me or just being completely inappropriate?_

"I-I'm sorry, sir, I'm afraid-" she begins, her voice sharp and determined, but her waves her off with his meaty hand.

"Don't worry, feather," he says, drawing out the pet name as he finally moves to make the cotton candy. "You're a mighty fine vixen but I think that your girlfriend over there would kill me in my sleep."

Maura's mind blanks. "Excuse me?"

He glances over her shoulder, nodding at something behind Maura. The Red Sox cap is still obscuring most of his expression from this angle, so she doesn't see how serious he is. "Your girl is green with envy there. Think she's gonna come over if you linger any longer."

 _He must mean Jane…_

Sure enough, she turns to see Jane, who has her arms folded over her chest. The phone call with her mother must have been brief and heated, a normality with the Rizzoli women. Now Jane's face is twisted in disappointment and fury.

And something else that Maura doesn't quite recognize from this distance. With or without her Quantico facial studies.

He turns and holds out the candyfloss. "$4"

Rifling through her jean pocket, Maura produces the money and slides it over the counter. Rendered speechless from her inability to respond to the man's comment, Maura takes the Barbie-pink fluff cones and totters her way in the direction of Jane.

"Y'all have a good day now," he chuckles, his deep, grumbling voice floating after her.

When she reaches Jane the detective is still slightly slumped and sombre. Yet she does gain a faint smile when Maura gracefully sits back beside her and hands her the candyfloss.

"Thanks, Maura," she says quietly. She moves to start the pink fluff when she notices Maura is simply stunned, staring into space.

"Maura…?"

Maura jumps, startled, and purses her lips. "Jane? Do you remember all of the items on my bucketlist?"

Jane's eyes drift away as she loses herself in thought, and then she hunches her shoulders. "Not all of them, no. Why?"

Maura nibbles her lip, and then huffs out a breath of frustration.

"Is it still technically flirting with a stranger if you are not the instigator?"

* * *

 _Dream 16: As a young girl, I was fascinated by the human need to create or destroy._

 _The beginning of my dream was more of a memory, but by the time I woke up it had splintered into fragments of an unfamiliar nightmare._

 _I dreamed that I was gazing down at the boulevard of my youth; the one paved with dull, worn cobblestones and lined with leafy horse chestnuts and box elders._

 _In the winter, I would look out of the window in the living room of our Parisian apartment and see them heavy with snow, their branches drooping. The blankets of virgin white were disturbed only by the tiny track marks left by the birds who sought shelter from the frigid cold._

 _The fire would be crackling behind me. From her studio at the rear of the building, the stench of the my mother's paint would waft in and scorch the insides of my nostrils._

 _But still, in my dream I persevered at the windowsill, marvelling undeterred at the beauty that the pure snow brought to every crack, split or rough edge that the city usually wore._

 _I was astonished, in my youth and now as a grown woman, at the extent to which a human being – an artist- will go in order to create something to call their own. For generations to come after them; to bow and kneel and worship at these neo-altars._

 _Beyond my childhood street are the slated rooftops of Paris, their chimneys smoking steadily. And there jutting up from the skyline is the symbol of French engineering prowess; the Eiffel Tower. Constructed only as part of a temporary exhibition in the late nineteenth century, it was never supposed to stay._

 _Yet still it stands, basking in the flashes of tourist cameras._

 _Perhaps the transformation from something sweet to something profound is like my friendship with Jane; how it too has deepened and become as vital to me as oxygen to haemoglobin._

 _People are dumbfounded by the beauty of Paris; I always was even as I spent a large portion of my childhood there. From my dream, that nostalgia lingers on, travelling from mind to heart to pen._

 _But my dream didn't just thrive in creation and its achievement. Around me, chaos bled into the landscape as Paris transformed before my eyes. Grey, bleak and lifeless; much as I imagined France and much of Europe to have been during the atrocities of the Second World War and the decimation which was left._

 _Though I wished to pull away from the window, to draw back in fear and revulsion, I was held in place by unseen forces, made to watch my dream wash away into a nightmare._

 _Smoking ruins and crumbled rubble were the bare bones left from the bombs and raids as dusty, shell-shocked faces look on. The smell of my mother's paint was gone. Now, the pungent odour of acidic gas and the decay of rotting flesh made my skin creep and my eyes water._

 _And yet there I was, helpless but to stand and watch it all form my point at the windowsill._

 _Like creation, destruction is a trait which lies in us all. We strive for it; to see our enemies fall, our loathed adversaries fail and the institutions and organizations that we oppose brought to their knees. We, as humans, are killers, bombers, raiders. We are destructive._

 _We are alive._

 _My dream was two visions of life; creation and destruction, I fear them both._

 _At this time, I am uncertain of how to interpret this._


	8. Sending All My Love To You

Guys. _Guys._ It's been over two weeks and I am so, so sorry! It won't happen again, I hope. Between the end of exam celebrations and being bed bound with infection for nearly a week, I'm not sure whether I'm coming or going. But here, have a long chapter. Lots of stuff happening here. Tell me what you think!

* * *

Though Maura is the biologist, Jane has learned enough to know that oxygen is essential in order to sustain life. It is a fundamental fact, and a simple one at that.

By default, humans barely notice the steady out and in of their life-sustaining breath. Every day they breathe but never realise it. It is a continuing instinct. It just happens.

Jane knows all of this, very well in fact.

Yet she sits here, constantly having to remind herself to breathe before the dizziness causes her to black out and slip right out of this seat.

On the night that they had first discussed their bucketlists, she knew that Maura had most looked forward to Jane becoming her mannequin for the night.

And surprisingly, Jane for all her usual gusto, is content to sit and enjoy their evening, rather than tug and pull restlessly at her attire. She notices the dark gaze she is being subjected to from across the table.

It sends trills of adrenaline up and down her spine.

"So," Jane begins, finding her voice. "Let's review. We've been doing this for three weeks now, right? How much have we accomplished?"

Maura is feverishly excited. She yanks her bag from the floor and scrambles her hand inside. She noisily jostles the contents. Finally, she retrieves her phone and waves it triumphantly in her hand, setting the bag back on the floor.

Jane finds her adorable.

Like always.

"I still have my list saved on my phone. Perhaps I should delete off the items that I have already completed," Maura suggests, typing in her pass code.

The pair sit back as a waiter refills their glasses. Jane sees the shimmer of the red liquid, black in the dim lighting, as Maura brings the glass up to her lips. Like the flick of a light switch, she decides to say something about the sizzling of tension in every one of their recent interactions.

But the light switches off just as abruptly, and she settles for silence once again.

They spend the next twenty minutes gasping, laughing, disbelieving and retelling the anecdotes which have coloured the last few weeks. Sometimes they playfully kick each other under the table.

Yet by the time they order their main course, Jane is clutching the menu so hard it creaks.

It is all she can do not to slip off her shoe and slide her foot up Maura's smooth bare thigh.

Their laughter is as intoxicating as the expensive, heady wine that they drink. Every so often, the wine stains Maura's bottom lip. Her tongue swipes out to clear it and Jane feels like she is tipping too far backwards in her chair.

"Tony the tiger! I swear to God, Maura. She thought I was Tony the tiger from the cereal commercials," Jane laughs, remembering the giddiness of the little girl. So thin and frail; animated to life at the sight of Jane in her tiger costume.

Maura's laugh is breathy and uncontrolled; _genuine_. "What did you tell her? Did you explain that you weren't really Tony?"

Jane splutters indignantly. "Are you kidding? No way was I gonna break that kid's heart!" she says, her eyes glazing as the restaurant falls away and a little girl's pale, sickly face remains.

 _Cecile._

A sombre weight descends upon Jane. Pushing her shoulders down into a slump and her brow into a frown.

"What's wrong?" Maura asks.

Jane picks up the wine glass, holding it by the delicate stem and swirling the wine inside. "I promised her I would come back and visit again."

The statement prickles with pain.

"Will you go back?"

Jane doesn't responds straight away. She watches the liquid frothing inside the glass for another heartbeat or two. Somewhere in the restaurant kitchen, a plate or four crashes to the tiled floor. Half a dozen infuriated muffled voices are heard.

Jane exhales a sigh which is so deep, she fully expects herself to deflate right there in the chair like a punctured hot air balloon. She sets down the glass.

"She only has six months left," Jane utters mournfully, swallowing and choosing to stare at the god awful pattern on the tacky carpet instead of into Maura's eyes.

 _And I don't wanna return in case I form a bond which will only break me down when the inevitable wave of mind-shattering grief consumes me._

Jane flexes her toes in her shoes as discomfort ripples through her body. Creeping over her skin. Across the table, she can sense Maura struggling. Because how will she find the words to comfort someone who has no real need to be comforted?

"I'm sorry, Jane," Maura commiserates. "I'm sure that she was a treasure."

Jane leans back in her chair with a smile. One which she knows is too far over the line of inauthentic to make Maura feel reassured.

They don't resume their conversational flow until their main courses arrive. Jane isn't sure if there is any better taste in that world that the dish in front of her.

 _Maybe the woman in front of me..._

Her eyes trail to Maura's plate. And then to Maura.

Times likes these make Jane Rizzoli hate the paths her mind seems to involuntarily wander.

But Maura is fretting over something else entirely. Jane can see that from the faraway look in the doctor's eyes. The mechanical nature of her eating. The twitches of concentration and thought which processes through Maura's facial expressions.

Jane lowers her knife and fork to her plate. She wipes her mouth and swallows, sucking in a breath before speaking.

"You alright, Maur?"

Maura jumps, startled out of her own thoughts at Jane's question. She dabs her mouth with her napkin, glancing around at the other tables self consciously.

"Do you believe in reincarnation?" Maura asks timidly.

Jane tilts her head and scrunches up her nose. "Putting prisoners back in jail?"

Maura's eyes dance with amusement, and she smiles endearingly. "No. The belief that we are immortal souls, and that when we die we are born again as another being. While its origins are obscure, it is still a popular belief in many spiritual sects to this day."

"So, what? I die and become a turtle or something?"

Maura shrugs. "Theoretically, yes. Though I very much doubt it works quite like that."

Jane digests this. "So what would you want to be?"

Maura dismisses the question with a shake of her head. "Your choice of body is out of the question."

Jane is disappointed by this, but perks up and fires the question back across the table. "What about you? Do you believe in reincapitation?"

"No, but..." Maura hesitates, then narrows her eyes. "And it's _reincarnation_ , Jane."

But Jane doesn't allow the distraction. "Say it. Whatever you were going to say, but doubted herself."

Maura shuts her eyes as the confession falls from her lips. "Sometimes I... I feel like I've known you in a past life. One, two, maybe a thousand. I know I've never really had a true, real friend before you so I'm not sure it's accurate to compare but, I do."

Jane stares at Maura, not wanting to reply straight away in case she heard it all wrong. But the fire in her chest lets her known the truth.

"I agree," she croaks.

She wants to pull Maura out into a side alley and take her passionately against the wall, where Maura's gasps and squeals of delight get lost in the rush of main street traffic.

Or lay her delicately on the bed and kiss every square inch of bare skin.

She would settle for shimmying under the table right now and mouthing her way up the insides of Maura's thighs but having her scream Jane's name in such a fancy, public environment may not be appropriate.

Maura's eyes flutter open. "You do?" she whispers.

Jane's jaw locks, so all she can do is nod dumbly. The vibrant, smile which splits across Maura's face is worth it, even if she never spoke another word again.

But underlying it all is a sinister tone, like a crusty, moulded edge instead of a silver lining.

Jane, revelling in all of her darkest insecurities, has one question she's been dying to ask since they drew up their bucketlists.

And with Maura's naked honesty about how she believes they have been companions or lovers in any possible previous life, she can't help but try and sate her own curiosity.

Maura must see the inner battle spill out into the twisting expressions of Jane's face, because she asks, "Now, I believe, it's you that has something to share."

 _Just ask, Rizzoli. What's the worst that could happen?_

"Have you ever been, you know, with another woman?" Jane murmurs, cautious not to share the topic with any potential eavesdroppers at the other tables.

The question knocks Maura off kilter. She straightens her cutlery on her plate, buying her more time. She clears her throat. "Yes, I have."

The answer is not unexpected. Maura was raised in Europe, after all. It's common knowledge between Rizzoli and Isles that while Jane is hotter on pop culture, Maura is far more _cultured_.

Yet that doesn't mean Jane doesn't get split up the middle with a searing blade.

"But...on your bucketlist...?"

"Yes," Maura concedes. "I've been with women before, but never in the city of Boston. I've had lovers in New York, San Francisco, even Quantico."

"Quantico? Jesus, now I don't feel so edgy about Dean," Jane says. They laugh, the unease receding from their body language.

"At one point I thought we were meant to be," Maura admits, running a fingertip around the rim of her glass. "She was an FBI profiler with crystal blue eyes and flowing red hair. She had to be moved into witness protection after a particularly difficult incident in New Orleans. I never saw her again, but she gave me a letter before she..."

Her voices hitches and dies.

Jane swallows, the pain radiating off of Maura affecting her too. "You don't have to tell me if it's too painful for you."

Maura flashes a weak but grateful smile. "The letter documented how she was deeply in love with me, and how she wasn't sure she was going to bear the separation."

 _I can relate_ , Jane thinks.

"When... when was the last time you were, umm, intimate with a woman?" The words twirl clumsily around her mouth, slipping around and away from her tongue like ice on a wet surface. "I mean, wait, you don't have to answer that if it's too personal."

"Almost a year ago," Maura says.

Jane is slapped in the face. _So recently? Maybe it was when she went to that conference in Chicago..._

"Wow. Go Maura," she manages, before taking a generous gulp of wine. She comes dangerously close to sloshing it down the front of her dress, since her hands are shaking so violently.

"Indeed," Maura acquiesces. "I believe it was Erica Jong in her book Fear of Flying who coined the phrase 'the zipless fuck'. We all have needs, Jane. Women too."

 _Please stop. Imagining you in bed with any woman who isn't me makes me long to shoot myself. Again._

As if through divine intervention, a waiter floats over to their table and asks if they are finished their meals. It provides the much needed close to their conversation.

Jane just wants to go home and curl herself into a ball.

Everything is tasteless and cheap now anyway.

* * *

"Have we got everything we need?"

Jane's voice filters in from the next room.

It makes Maura smile as she takes another sip of her coffee. Jane is acting like a hyper child. It may just be the most adorable side of the detective she has seen so far in their friendship.

Jane slides into the living room on her sock soles. Maura is treated to a glimpse of what she may have been like as a sports-obsessed teenager. She is dressed in her Red Sox jersey with her cap peaked on her head.

"Maura, this game is gonna be crazy!" Jane says, plonking down on the couch beside her. "The seats you got are..." She gesticulates wildly, unable to provide the words she is looking for.

Maura laughs, shaking her head in exasperation. "Jane, we don't have to leave for at least an hour yet. Don't wear yourself out so soon!"

"Oh, don't worry, I don't wear out easily. I could go all day and all night," Jane boosts.

Maura chokes on her coffee. A blush the colour of the Red Sox jersey she wears creeps up Jane's neck and face.

She look as if she wants to go up to the roof space at the top of Maura's house. And maybe just stay there, collecting dust and wasting away for eternity.

"I mean...well, I can't...not that I _couldn't_ , I just- shit-uh..." Jane lifts her cap and rakes her hand through her hair, clearing her throat. She throws her hands up into the air. "Hey, I didn't thank you for getting us such awesome tickets for the game."

Maura, whose eyes still water form the hacking over the coffee, smiles thinly. "No, you didn't," she says.

"Don't you wish I would?" Jane hears the words coming out of her mouth, and from the way her eye twitches, she knows just how it sounded as well.

She jumps to repair the meaning, before she plunges into further self-humiliation. "Y'know, maybe take you to dinner later? My treat, since you took me last night." Jane chokes again. "To dinner! Took me to dinner."

It would be easier for Maura to answer if she didn't have vivid, technicolour flashes of just _how_ Jane could thank her running rampant inside her head.

She imagines chemical formulae on a blackboard. The lecture hall is empty save for her. She stands before it, neck craned back, working through the steps, going through the motions. She attains the solution in good time. She smiles.

Finally able to ground herself in the familiar detached, clinical mindset of science, able to push every sliver of desire away inside, Maura returns to the present. Jane is fidgeting, pressing and rubbing at the scars on her palms.

"Your scars. Are they aching?"

Jane is disgruntled and unsettled. She shifts on the couch and scowls at her scars, like they could explain why she always makes an ass of herself around Maura.

"No. Just force of habit," Jane mumbles, dropping her hands to her lap.

But Maura takes them anyway. Gingerly lifting one from Jane's lap, gently applying pressure. The result is like an electrical current jolting up through Jane's arm. Maura can see rising goosebumps on Jane's bare forearm.

And then Jane gets a far off look. The one she has when she is remembering something as clear as if she were living in that very moment. Maura's mouth goes dry as Jane snaps out of the reverie. And now her eyes are watching Maura work in a new light of adoration and astonishment.

Maura shyly averts her gaze, not able to hold Jane's gaze for long.

"Speaking of thanking you," Jane says, her voice devoid of anything except pure earnest. "I never thanked you for saving my hands."

Maura's ministrations freeze. Her eyes rise gradually back to Jane's, trailing inch by inch as Maura tries to work out what exactly Jane is referring to. "What do you mean?"

Jane's fingers twitch in Maura's loose grasp. Without breaking eye contact, the doctor resumes massaging Jane's hand.

"I've always had this hot ball of anxiety and shame that comes every time I think about Hoyt," Jane explains thickly. "He makes me feel dirty, and wrong. And I know that people tell me I'm strong or courageous or a survivor or whatever, but I am what am when it comes to him. A victim."

Jane breathes out deeply and close her eyes. Maura feels blips of pleasure that tickle her own hands on Jane's; on the act of embracing through subtle touch.

"I was just thinking, yknow. When he- _Hoyt-_ ah..." Jane struggles, covering her forehead with her free hand. "You made sure I didn't do any more damage to my hands. And you got chewed out for drugging me when we got the hospital, too. And I was so out of it, I didn't even thank you."

"You were going through the aftermath of a major trauma, Jane. No one could thank you for not thinking about something as trivial as a thank you." Maura's voice is very quiet, because if she speaks any louder it will probably break. "Besides, I would get rebuked a thousand times and more if it meant that you were okay."

They share a smile, feeling the room bleeding out into pale shades, while they stay in focus. Maura could sit here forever; Jane's hand cradled in hers. Maura staring into the eyes of this beautiful, eccentric, unique woman. Her heart not even beating in her chest.

But then a text buzzes on Jane's phone, and the world flourishes back into colour. Her hand leaves Maura's, and the loss is so unnatural that when she checks the text, Maura catches herself waiting for Jane to return her hand straight back again.

"Just Ma. Hoping we enjoy ourselves today," Jane grumbles, slapping her hands onto her thighs. "Okay, enough being mellow. We have a game to get to, Dr. Isles!"

They got to their feet and as Jane heads for her keys, Maura is hit with a wave of dizzying euphoria at Jane's frank thank you.

She beams, her heart jerking inside her chest, spasming with love and lust and adoration.

"Go, Red Sox!"

* * *

 _Opera wasn't so bad_ , Jane decides, as she and Maura walk through the darkening streets of Boston. _It was kinda funny in parts, and overall I didn't think it was a snoozefest. I consider this a win for the good guys._

Beside her, Maura is smiling faintly as the night breezes starts to sift through her hair. They are on their way to eat in the restaurant area of a grand hotel. Something which Maura suggested would finish off their evening perfectly.

Jane's thumb taps the outside of her black purse as they stroll along at their leisure. It occurs to her for the first time that Maura managed to get her to dress up fancy again this week.

 _Sneaky._

Still, she's glad of the heels, makeup and dress when they are in sight of the hotel. Everything sparkles, from the marble floor clearly visible through the lobby windows and the large, crystal chandelier which beckons her towards the revolving door.

"Wow," Jane murmurs.

Maura nudges her shoulder, before picking up the pace and striding confidently towards the doorman. Catching sight of the ME, the doorman smiles and bows his head.

"Doctor Isles. I'm sad to say I haven't seen you around here much lately," he says. When his eyes lift to Jane, his polite smile grows as his eyes run down her attire. "And you've brought company again. Are you reserving a room?"

Maura blushes. Jane's mind registers the nervous, shameful way Maura shuffles her feet before the words actually make their way into her mind.

 _Wait, company? Reserving a room..._

"No, Thomas, but I am here for the Chef's special. I trust it hasn't changed since the last time I was here?" Maura asks, diverting the focus of the conversation.

Thomas' grin doesn't leave his face as he chuckles, wiping at his chin. He looks like a bashful boy with his favourite teacher, despite being a whole head taller than Maura. "Nope. But that's not a bad thing, I hope."

"Certainly not. Thank you," Maura nods at him and then heads through the revolving door. Thomas winks at Jane, who lingers for a second longer before tottering off after the ME.

Maura is checking her golden watch, adjusting it over her wrist as Jane joins her again. The detective has more than a few questions rattling around in her mind, but she tries not to come off as aggressive.

"So, you've been here before then," she starts.

Maura's mouth twitches as she clicks her nail on the face of the watch. She gives up, sighing and turning to fully face Jane. "A few times. But we won't get into that tonight," Maura replies cryptically.

Jane blinks. _Okay, Dr. Isles._

Maura brightens up. "So did you enjoy Carmen?"

"I mean, I didn't really get what they were saying, cause it was Spanish and all," Jane points out, shrugging her shoulder. "But yeah. It was pretty good."

"¡Qué triste!" Maura retorts, batting her eyelashes in false sympathy. Jane gapes.

 _She speaks Spanish?_

 _God, imagine her speaking Spanish in bed..._

"Look Jane. A wedding reception," Maura says, pointing into the function room of the hotel. "Remember your bucket list?"

They stand in the lobby, listening to the humping beat of an age old classic...

"Oh my god, Maura. They're playing the Macarena!" Jane gasps, grabbing her friend's hand and instantly dragging her towards the function room. She pulls and moves like a child in a toy store, disregarding their formal clothes and appearance entirely.

The room has been dimmed for the purposes of the disco, the coloured lights flashing patterns on a dancefloor filled with men and women, still dressed in their suits and outfits.

Only now, after more than a few glasses of champagne, the ties have been loosened and the high heels thrown off. Rows of clumsy, bumbling adults whoop and jump and perform vaguely remembered dance steps, no matter how simple, to the Macarena.

Maura and Jane slip inside and blend in with the crowd due to their evening wear. Jane wants to head to the dancefloor but Maura tugs her back.

"I don't know this dance," she hisses, fretting.

Jane grins wickedly, pulling her onwards still as she tries to heads backwards. "Don't worry, Maur. It's real simple."

Jane helps her master the strange, 4-bar dance repeat. She is ablaze with euphoria, laughing until her guts seizes. Some time during the dance, they manoeuvre themselves into the centre of the mass.

Then the song changes. All of the energy and easy laughter from the Macarena fizzles away into the air. The ethereal, reverberating piano melodies shake the tone of the room, transforming it into a physical love letter. With bodies on every side of them, they have nowhere to escape.

 _I text a postcard sent to you; did it go through?_

Their eyes meet in panic and uncertainty. The couples around them have paired up. They sway to the crooning overtones that filter through the speakers.

 _Sending all my love to you..._

Throwing caution to the wind, Maura takes the initiative. Jane's stomach churns as she takes a step forward. After one more moment's consideration, she slides her arms around Jane's waist. Laying her head upon her shoulder.

 _You are the moonlight of my life, every night..._

Jane's arms tentatively come up around Maura, holding her close as they shuffle to the ballad. She doesn't want to ruin this. She won't question this. She closes her eyes, resting her head upon Maura's. This may well be the single greatest moment of her love life and she is sure as hell gonna milk it for every last drop.

 _Giving all my love to you..._

The song is hypnotic, letting the room dissolve into far off lights. To Jane, everything sounds like it's being heard through cotton; like a thick blanket has been thrown over her head.

But there is something she can hear pounding through the density, and that's the pounding of her own heart in her eardrums. She is sure that Maura can hear it, with her ear being presses just above it. The heat of them together makes her stomach curl inside of her. She would be sure she is floating, if her feet weren't shuffling along on the dancefloor.

The minutes drift by, the melody goes on. Jane and Maura are frozen in time. This close, intimate dance they partake in doesn't even alarm them. It's like a dreamscape; coloured lights flash in their eyes. The only lights in this world and Jane's pretty sure nothing will have consequences here.

She wonders if she could kiss Maura now.

 _Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh freak out!_

The jolt of funk bass and guitar rhythms makes everyone around them burst into a cheer. Hands are thrown into the air and most of those who went to hover at the edges of the dancefloor prance back on.

Snapping out of their idealistic moment, Jane and Maura are jilted apart by the sudden shift in atmosphere. Both are flushed, and wide eyed. Though drunken, upbeat strangers are laughing and shifting around them, they only have eyes for each other.

 _Oh god, oh god should I pretend nothing happened? Like this was all forgotten? Like I'm not going mad just trying not to kiss her right now?_ Jane frantically thinks.

Luckily, with whatever dignity and tact reminds inside of her, Maura clears her throat and jerks her head, mouthing ' _Dinner?'_.

"I literally couldn't agree more," Jane mutters.

She nods and smiles as she passes an intoxicated man at one of the circle tables. He waves back at her, before slumping forward on his hand and falling promptly back to sleep.

* * *

Jane remembers being a teenager in love.

How she would pace around her room listening to pop stars on the radio talk of love and lust and think that she could relate. She would sing along when her brothers were out. She was so embarrassed that they might catch her.

Jane Rizzoli the softball player, singing about being a young girl in love.

Casey Jones had made her doubt everything that she believed in up until that point. Every dirt smeared T shirt and scratched knee was wiped away from her psyche when he was there. With him she wasn't a girl or a teenager. She was something more than all of that. Something removed and human and normal.

He didn't fault her for not being like the other girls, as cringeworthy as Jane thinks that sounds now. He didn't mind that she didn't wear dresses, and yet she wouldn't have minded wearing one for him. He came to some of her softball matches, coming to see her in the dugout whether or not she won.

At the time, she convinced herself that he was only there to see the other girls. They were prettier or skinnier than she was. Retrospectively, and after some conversations with the solider, Jane realises that as a teenager she could have had that beautiful fantasy.

Years of heartache and trauma and growing up in the big bad world had taught her that she had just been a silly little girl who filled her head with fantasies of what it would be like to actually be with the one you want to.

The one that makes Her heart pound so hard that she feels like she is going to throw up. That makes her blood so hot in her veins she thinks that it will melt her skin.

Casey Jones was her high school crush. Nothing more now than a friend she occasionally saw when he jetted back from wherever the US boots were on the ground. His involvement in her life should have taught her all she needed to know about not getting too caught up in someone.

And yet here she is, pacing her room in her socks, tank top and shorts, listening to the radio and thinking about Maura Isles. It is a different time, a different age, a different name; a different _gender_. But Jane is back being a teenager in love, her veins thumping in her neck, her head spinning with the idea that she craves someone so badly.

From her spot on the sofa, Jo Friday cracks open one eye to spy what her owner is doing. With idle curiosity she watches Jane mutter to herself while tapping a biro pen against her palm.

The song on the radio is at a low, almost murmuring volume; Jane keeps it there out of respect from her neighbours at such a late hour. The hum of a car crescendos and then fades.

The heat of Maura's body pressed so tightly to her own haunts her. The smell of perfume that hung around Maura's neck; light and fruitier than her usual selection.

How, the moment they had chosen to crash and dance had been the exact one where the tempo slowed. Instead of the rowdy, celebratory mood they had anticipated, the soothing, numbing effect of a love song came down upon them.

Jane had felt drunk. Terrified that as they found themselves in each other's arms, she would stumble and tramp on Maura's toes. Or her gawky, taller body would do something equally as embarrassing.

Growing frustrated, Jane yelps as she stamps her foot, jabbing her socked heel into the floor. Awakened by the outburst from her dozing on the couch, Jo Friday leaps down, her claws clacking on the wooden floor.

"Oh no, Jo. I'm sorry," Jane mumbles, kneeling down and slapping her palms together.

Tentatively, uncertain of her owner's mood, Jo trots over to Jane. She sits down as Jane's hands go to work scratching behind her ears.

Jane heaves a sigh. "Jo, what am I gonna do?" The little dog shifts closer to Jane, enjoying the attention. Jane smiles, but it holds pain. "I can't just- just _fall in love_ with Maura."

There it is.

She's finally admitted it out loud.

In Jane Rizzoli's logic, it therefore must be true now.

When Jane gets tossed into the black sea of her mind, once again drowning without rescue in her emotions and confusion, her hands pause on the dog's back. With a grumble of discontent, Jo sets her chin on Jane's knee, staring up at her with black eyes.

Jane snaps out of her daze, resuming her movements. Like a predator stalking out from a dark mass of shade and into the day, a choking thought eclipses her.

"Jeez, Jo. What if I can't tell her? What if I don't get to tell her?" Jane wheezes, pulling Jo Friday further into her arms, needing the comfort only an oblivious, blindly adoring animal brings. "What if I never do and she finds some amazing surgeon-lawyer-politician guy with straight white teeth and fantastic hair? And they'll get married, and she'll have his kids and..."

Jane's voice gets lodged in her chest. She stares into space, tears stinging her eyes as many revelations crash into her at once.

 _I can't handle this... I can't..._

Sensing her owner's distress, the dog squirms in Jane's arms, and then two paws are pushing against her chest. When Jane blinks, Jo Friday is contemplating her in the canine way, her head cocked to the side.

Jane nods, still feeling suffocated. "Yeah, I know. I got to go to bed before I stick my gun between my teeth."

But just as Jane prepares for bed, she realises she forgot a crucial part of her daily routine; writing herself a note every day. And so, just before she turns off the light, Jane scribbles down a single sentence on a piece of paper;

 _If I don't tell her I love her, will she find someone who will?_


	9. The Story of My Life

Happy Sunday! I've got a feeling that you guys are gonna like this one, maybe. Maybe not. Probably not idk. But if you do, feel free to drop me a line or two in a review. I always appreciate it. Not long to go now, either, so don't worry; this won't trundle on forever. Some of you have questions from previous chapters; message my tumblr, it's in my bio. Thanks again!

* * *

 _A dusty, arid city in the heart of a country at war. This land is far from the land of hope, liberty and glory. Yet here I am._

 _I am awake._

 _I am alive._

 _They are wheeling soldiers past me into the emergency room. They are a khaki blur. Some of them are fitting, violent seizures tossing their bodies like electrified rag dolls on their stretchers and trolleys. We cannot cope with them all. There are too many. Most of them are wheezing._

 _Most of them are dying._

" _Dr Isles?"_

 _Bless pure Victoria. Poor Victoria._

 _A little field nurse on her first tour, standing there in her protective gear, not fully understanding the horrors that the chemical attack will bring._

" _I'm right there, Vicky," I call reassuringly, rushing to follow her out from where I was yanking on my own protective suit. The gas mask is tight, and it catches on my hair. But I will be grateful when I can breathe and survive._

" _What do we have, gentlemen?" I reach the first trolley, but as I look down into lifeless eyes and blue lips splattered with half coughed dark blood, I know that it is already hopeless._

 _I glance at my team and we skim to the next. At least this body is still jerking. Some sign of life. Nurse Amy Lancaster is spluttering out statistics. I pry the soldier's eye open and shine in my torch; his pupils are already dilating._

" _What was the gas? What did this?" I ask, already cutting open the material of his camouflage uniform._

 _Lancaster eyes flitter around the faces of the staff who have joined our merry band around the dying soldier. This soldier is one of an endless stream that are being carted into this facility, but right now we shall concentrate only on him. I put both of my gloved and heavily restrained hands on him to hold him firm as Victoria inserts a line into his vein._

" _We don't know yet...well, umm...Dr Pichonaz said-" the nurse practically chokes on her tongue._

 _Pichonaz, as if hearing himself called upon, skids into the room and announces the worst_

" _Hydrogen cyanide, everyone! Be careful," his heavily accented voice squeals, "No one makes skin contact, do I make myself clear?" The veins of his forehead are visible even through the screen of his protective headgear._

 _My hands are off of the body in a flash as I straighten with a whoosh of air. It is impulsive, if unnecessary. I know the protective W.H.O. issued suit that I wear protects me from the possibility of transference of hazardous toxins. Still, when an alarm went up to alert us of a surprise insurgent chemical attack, never in all of my worst terrors could I have imagined the use of hydrogen cyanide._

" _That can't be right. The Chemical Weapons Convention- didn't it completely outlaw...?"_

 _I trail off when I see the abundance of cynical faces locked behind plastic screens. I feel their disenchantment with this world and humanity bit my skin._

 _I don't blame them. As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I hear their hollowness ringing in the air. We are medical staff in a country which rarely adheres to basic human rights, never mind global political sanctions._

 _This being said, I focus myself into the moment, armed with the knowledge that many of these men and women are simply going to choke and bleed on our quarantined beds. I don't say this, no matter how sourly I feel it inside. I am a team leader and I plan to do just that._

 _Lead._

 _The soldier under my hands is already struggling with extremely abnormal heartbeats, verging on dysrhythmias which will no doubt collapse into full cardiac arrest._

 _From the wet choking sounds his body splutters and jerks with, it is clear that there is a substantial capacity of fluid in his lungs._

" _Pulmonary edema," I whisper. It is a breathy hiss inside of my protective head gear._

 _Despite our best efforts to hold him down, he is flopping on this bed like a fish on a line. He is drowning on dry land._

 _It seems, with the sudden realisation of what exactly caused this tragic predicament, that there isn't much we can do for these soldiers._

 _My jaw clenches. Inside of my mouth, my teeth crunch together._

 _I did not come to this hot, warn-torn disgraceful excuse of a country just to look upon every patient in dire, desperate need of medical aid and snort with disgust, turning away because the odds were grim._

 _I will not let my oath ring meaningless. I set to work._

 _Yet the man dies ten minutes later._

 _Of a group of fifteen, one survives. And even then, he is in a critical condition._

 _Our unit continues to be locked in quarantine when I do a melancholy inspection some time later. Every bed has a white sheet over it, a still body tented beneath. Some sheets are soaked with fluids and bloody streaks with the sodden efforts to save the life of the soldier, ultimately in vain._

 _I stop at each bed, pulling back the sheet to peer at the faces. They deserve my respect, every last one. All individually. They came here to serve their country, and ended up dying in a toxic cloud of poisonous gas. No one should die like that._

 _Victoria comes into the room. We trade sad smiles. She looks exhausted. I know I look the same._

 _In the morning a commander will be here from some regiment or other, and when the bodies have been adequately decontaminated, then the process of flying them home to their grieving families for their funerals can begin._

 _I reach the last body. Another female. Of the fifteen patients, four were women. This person used to be one of them. I lift the sheet._

 _I take one look at the lifeless face-_

 _The colours of my world run into one another. Like a painter who throws a bucket of water over his art in a moment of self-destructive rage._

 _I shriek and wheel backwards. The sheet drops back from where I snatch back my hand but it is too late. I have already seen the lifeless eyes. The alabaster skin marked with trails of crusty, bloody vomit. Its grey colour a far cry from the tan it should hold. The dusty, matted black hair._

" _Dr Isles?" Victoria calls to me from somewhere in the blurring, swirling painting._

 _Dilated, unseeing black eyes are staring at me in my mind. The sheet has fallen back but those eyes don't go away, like a Polaroid flashed and printed and brought into existence where it shall remain._

" _Dr Isles? Are you alright?"_

 _I feel the world reduced to the obnoxiously loud wheezes of my own breathing inside of this mask. The sheet does nothing to dull the stark, blank face in my mind. The face of a soldier I used to know._

" _Maura...?"_

 _Jane..._

"Maura!"

Sucking air into her lungs as if she had been suffocated, Maura bolts upright in bed and pants for air. When the gulps of oxygen stop her head spinning and her heart rate stops thumping quick so loudly in her ears, she comes back down to earth, realising that she is in her bedroom. Safe in the mighty neighbours of Beacon Hill.

 _Safe._

Frankie Rizzoli is standing in her bedroom, arms swinging limply by his sides. His eyes are big and frightened in a way that triggers a great sympathy in Maura. It takes him a while to pull his collar away from his neck and find his voice.

"You were ah...screaming for Jane. I thought you might be umm, y'know, hurt," he supplies. "I was looking for Ma in the guesthouse and heard so I came and..."

He trails off, becoming suddenly self-aware. Here he stands in Maura Isles' bedroom, somewhere intimate and private. Maura can almost hear the way his mind is churning;

The only guests that get entertained here are...

His mind drifts back to the woman on the bed, waiting patiently for him to speak again. He swallows audibly.

It appears that both his mind and stomach cramp.

Maura is inwardly smirking at his sheepish expression. He looks like a little boy who has lost his mother in a crowded grocery store. She decides to be gracious.

"Have you had breakfast yet, Frankie?" Maura asks politely.

"Uh, no," Frankie answers, shrugging his jacket and fixing his tie.

Maura waves at the open doorway. "Please, go ahead and help yourself. Jane does. I'll be down in just a moment."

He flashes a grateful smile her way and then he's gone.

Alone now, Maura's smile falls away and she gingerly lowers herself back against her pillow. She flinches when she feels the damp patch left from where her sweat soaked into the cotton during her nightmare. Truth be told, the room starts to twist and bend every time she envisions that face...

Cold and dead and bloody...

"Maura? You got Lucky Charms?" Frankie shouts.

"The cupboard to the immediate left of the fridge!" she calls back.

Maura used to fear the chemical weapons. It was always a possibility when she worked in the dangerous, insurgent run areas of northern Africa, just before her relief work with Ian in Uganda. She almost threw up every time the siren for the drill wailed.

But in the dream she was calm, cool, level headed. It was who died due to the attack which scars her very soul.

She shudders. Turns over to curl up on her side. But she doesn't close her eyes. For every time she does, she sees the dilated, unseeing brown eyes which she hopes she never has to see again.

Fear in the mind is a terrible thing.

* * *

The dough sticking in between her fingers as she kneaded it wasn't the most pleasant thing in the world.

But the smell of it baking in the oven just might be.

Jane's barefeet pads around in the kitchen, where she is refilling their glasses. With carbonated, sugar fuelled drinks that Maura professes to loathe, no less. Jane doesn't have any wine, and refused to let her friend drink water, so the compromise was entirely Maura's.

Maura currently sits hidden from Jane's view. Cross-legged on the rug of Jane's living room area. The coffee table has been pushed away to make space for the fort the two of them have made. After an hour of fixing and constructing their perfect pillow-floored fort, finally they were able to start baking cookies.

Of course, Maura had taken Jane out to dinner first. She forced her to eat something healthy just to balance out the cookies and the snacks they were likely to munch their way through in the evening.

Much to Jane's chagrin.

Jane's head ducks beneath the entrance to the fort. Their only light is the setting sun and a lamp Maura insisted upon using. She said she didn't trust the faulty Christmas lights which would no doubt send them up in flames.

Jane eyes Maura, who is beaming up at her with childlike glee. It isn't long until her own face is splitting into a wide grin. She inches her way inside, crossing her long legs as she settles herself down beside Maura.

"So, Doctor Isles, what's your hypothesis on the fort and the cookies so far?" Jane asks, pushing some hair behind her ears.

Maura's brow creases. "I don't believe hypothesis is the correct word, Jane."

Jane shrugs, wiggling her toes. She shifts to get more comfortable. "So cookies, check. Fort, check. Deep dark secret, no."

Maura also shuffles. "Dark secret...hmmm. Yes, I've been considering what this could be since we drew up our lists."

"Bucketlists are fun. Yay," Jane breathes sarcastically, but then softens. She puts a hand on Maura's knee. "No, seriously. I don't mind. But if you wanna tell me something deep, know that I'm not gonna judge you."

Maura dips her head in appreciation.

Jane pretends that she's not melting at the warmth of Maura's knee under her palm.

It seems Maura does have something revolving at the back of her mind. Jane can see it in the apprehension.

Maura takes a deep breath. "After you shot yourself-" They both wince. "-Well, when you were unconscious in the hospital I became obsessed with poetry about...death."

Jane tries not to let the shock register on her face. She doesn't want to spook Maura at such a vulnerable moment.

"Okay," she breathes, eyes skirting maura's face. "Any particular reason or was it because...?"

 _You were afraid you were gonna lose me._

Both of them acknowledge the unspoken words. Maura answers as if Jane had said them aloud anyway.

"Yes. Yes it was because I feared I had lost you. I had spates of atrocious nightmares, so real and..." Maura shakes her head. " _Ambulances_ by Philip Larkin was the worst. I couldn't get through it without convulsing and bursting into tears at the very thought of..."

Maura's jaw clenches. Jane cautiously reaches for her hand. She then sits back and absorbs the information, letting it steep in her blood like a toxin. She thinks she makes a throaty noise, but with her whole world currently revolving around the hazel eyes which drown her in feeling, she isn't entirely sure.

"Can you quote it?" She doesn't know where the question came from. While it doesn't really seem like the right thing to say, it isn't wrong thing either.

"I can recite it, if you wish?"

Losing her ability to speak, Jane nods solemnly as a means of encouragement.

Maura takes a shuddering breath, tracing her eyes upwards. " _Closed like confessionals, they thread - Loud noons of cities giving back none of the glances they absorb..."_

Jane listens to the cadences in Maura's voice. She is enthralled. The way emotion trembles just under the surface of each word, strong enough to threaten a crack or break but not quite making it happen.

At some point, Maura's eyes flutter closed. Jane takes this as the freedom to openly admire her beauty without fear that Maura would pick up on her dilating pupils or the blush rising up her chest and cheeks.

The rhythmic voice comes to a soft end. " _And dulls to distance all we are…"_

"That's incredible," Jane whispers. Her voice is as rough as sandpaper. She blinks and tries to reign in the need to lower Maura back onto the pillows. To kiss her until delicate, unblemished hands are buried deeply into brunette tresses. To rest her own hips between Maura's legs. To test their fit in the cradle of her thighs.

Maura looks shy, a lock of hair falling down over her face. "It's just a poem, Jane."

 _Yeah, and I'm just a fool for love._

Jane clears her voice. _Snap out of it, Rizzoli._ "You wanna check on those cookies?"

"They haven't been in the oven nearly long enough," Maura berates, but she dampens it with a smile.

Jane scowls. Maura smiles wider. "Such impatience."

"I like cookies. I hate waiting. Can you see the problem?"

Maura lies back on the pillows, staring up at the sheets strewn above them. It is usually a plain white sheet, but right now it's a patchwork of mandarin oranges and hazy yellows from the lamp light and the sunset.

Jane shuffles up to lie down beside her, just about avoiding the desire to crawl on top of her. She sighs, wiggling a little so her feet aren't sticking out the entrance. She forgets how tall she is, sometimes. Maura notices, and covers her mouth as she tries not to giggle.

"Stop, Maura," Jane whines.

Maura folds a hand underneath her head. "You must have been such a handful for your poor mother."

Jane's head snaps towards her. She gapes. "Poor mother? _Poor mother?!_ You've met Angela Rizzoli, right? Are we talking about the same woman?"

Maura grins. The type of unadulterated grin that Jane knows is only for her. Green eyes glisten with humour as they turn towards her.

Jane feels like when she was 16 and waiting for her boyfriend to kiss her for the first time. It wasn't her first kiss, but it would be the first one she actually _yearned_ for.

"Besides," Jane drawls, rolling her eyes. "Ma exaggerates a lot. I was a pretty good kid. Got a lot of cuts and bruises cause I wanted to be as tough as the boys but…" She shrugs, wiggling her bare toes.

Maura turns on her side, eyes still sparkling with humour as she watches Jane's profiles twitching due to fighting off a smile. "And now? Would you still like to be as tough as the other boys?"

Jane looks offended. "What do you mean _want to be_? I _am_ as tough!"

There is a moment of charged silence.

And then their fort is filled with laughter.

* * *

Jane sips on the coffee, ignoring the constant aching of her eyes. She is thankful that they are both off tomorrow. Once she crashes from this caffeine high she isn't sure she is going to wake up again.

She glances behind her, seeing the outline of Maura through the entrance of the tent. Even in the gloomy hour before the sun rises, Jane can see the rising and falling of the doctor's chest as she sleeps.

Maura had complained about how terrible it was that they would have to sleep without proper spinal support on the blankets and pillows on Jane's living room floor instead of a bed, but Jane just tuned her out after a while.

Eventually Maura gave up her lament on injuries to cervical, thoracic, lumbar and sacrum vertebrae.

Jane looks around the rest of the dark living room. There are the two plates of cookie crumbs just outside the fort. Jo Friday is curled up in her basket. When Jane had got up to make her third cup of coffee, the little dog had been jerking and growling in her sleep.

The detective heaves out a breath and rolls her shoulders. She is waiting for the sun to rise. Just to prove she had stayed awake the whole night. It surprised Maura, and when she realised it as truth is surprised herself, that despite working graveyard shifts covering cases in both Vice and Homicide, Jane had never actually witnessed a Boston sunrise.

She shifts, sighing again. Exhaustion claws at her muscles. The caffeine pumping in her blood is keeping her awake but at such a cost to her well being. She aches. Everywhere.

A soft murmur comes from inside the tent. She turns. Maura is leaning up a little, fisting her eyes and yawning. Jane grins. Chief Medical Examiner. Philanthropist. Perfectionist. And now she looks like a sleepy child.

"Jane?" Maura whispers groggily.

"Yeah?" Jane utters back, crawling back into the fort and settling herself on her stomach beside her friend.

"What time is it?"

"Uh…" Jane blindly pats an open palm out around her, eventually finding her phone in the darkness. She click on the screen, squinting and groaning at the harsh light. "5:34. Go back to sleep, Maura."

"What are you doing?"

The unusual husk of Maura's voice makes the hair on the back of Jane's neck stand on end. "What do you think I'm doing? Waiting for the sunrise, dummy."

"The sunrise?" Maura repeats dumbly, yawning and resting her head back on her pillow. "Why?"

Jane thumps her pillow into a better shape, and then turns onto her back. She doesn't get too comfortable; she doesn't want to fall asleep. "It's on my bucketlist. Sunset and sunrise."

"Oh," Maura murmurs, already drifting back to sleep. Then she cocks her head and opens an eye. "Speak to me." She closes it again.

Jane cocks her head. "Uh, Maura?"

Maura smiles but doesn't open her eyes. "Your voice holds calming properties for me."

"Calming properties?" Jane parrots.

Maura sighs, stretching her neck back and resettling on her pillow. "Yes."

Jane laces her hands on her stomach. "Is that really a thing, or did you make that up? Cause sometimes I think you make things up because you know I won't know the difference."

Maura chuckles, her sleep laden voice rich and deep. Jane's stomach quivers.

"Yes, Jane. Perhaps you are more familiar with music therapy. It is an alternative avenue of neuroscience in which the patient is treated through techniques related to the listening to or creation of music. There are different models which practise this theory, of course. The Nordoff-Robbins techniques, for example."

Jane squints up at the sheets above them. She is impressed that they haven't caved in around the pair.

"Okay. Maybe I should go for that the next time the department issues me with mandatory shrink-seeing duties. Could spend an hour a week doing some sick shredding on a Gibson. That would totally make me feel better."

Maura clucks her tongue on the roof of her mouth. Forever disappointed with Jane's inability to take anything seriously. She is quiet for a moment, and then repeats, "Speak to me."

"About?"

"Whatever you want to."

"Okay..." Jane laughs breathily. "Alpha beta, uno dos tres, one two skip a few ninety nine one hundred!"

Beside her, Maura trembles with hoarse laughter. The fort is too dark for Jane to really see but she feels it.

Jane clears her throat, grinning wildly at the frivolity. "Holy smokes, Batman! The Medical Examiner was a cyborg all along!"

Maura shakes harder. Jane laughs along with her, throwing up her hands. "I don't know what it is you want me to say. Biblical stories? Embarrassing tales from when I was in Vice? State capitols?"

Maura shifts onto her back, intertwining her hands onto her stomach just like Jane. She sighs again. "If you want," she croaks.

"Umm...okay..." Jane worries her bottom lip. "Well, there's grand old Boston, Massachusetts. No, wait I should have done them like the song...screw it. There's uh, Austin, Texas. And Tallahassee in Florida. Honolulu, Hawaii..."

"You're doing this in the strangest order, Jane." The amused voice from beside her made her scowl.

"Shhhh. Where was I?"

"You could be anywhere. You've just chosen four states with no geographical relevance to each other. It truly is anyone's guess as to how the next forty six states will come."

"Yeah _but_..." Jane stresses, holding up a finger. "You don't guess. So shh."

Another exasperated sigh signals for her to continue. "Lansing, Michigan. Oh, fun fact from the Rizzoli family files," Jane lilts, her voice sarcasm-heavy. "We took a road trip there once in my summer before high school. Spoiler alert: it sucked."

"How so?" Maura manages in between a yawn.

Jane bats a hand in the air. "Uh, the usual. Ma and Pop fighting most of the time, Tommy and Frankie being brats..."

Jane can feel the dull thumps of the caffeine in the back of her eyes. "But..." Hesitation. "But we went during a week or two of nice weather. So it meant the skies were really clear."

She notices that the sheets of the fort are starting to turn a misty blue colour. She smiles. Not too long now.

"I've never seen skies so clear. Or stars so bright. There's too much light pollution in the city, y'know?" Jane pauses. "Bet you have some fancy word for that, huh?"

No answer

Jane turns her head. "Maura...?"

The medical examiner is fast asleep. Jane watches her for a moment. The caffeine thrums in her veins. Or maybe it's the surge of affection she experiences every time she travels her eyes across the soft skin of Maura's unguarded face. Innocence. And purity. And little freckles which are set aflame by the first rays of sun.

"I wish I..." Jane blinks in surprise, not realising she was about to say what she wanted out loud, but since Maura doesn't answer, she continues. "I wish I could tell you in real life what I'm feeling, but I can't. Cause I'm a coward and..."

She swallows, leaning over to gingerly brush some of the hair away from Maura's brow. The doctor twitches, and Jane freezes. When Maura doesn't stir, Jane exhales shakily in relief. She feels like her lungs are being barred in. Like her ribs are shrinking to half their size.

"But as well as that..." Jane breathes, shifting on her side. "I have no idea what it is I'm actually feeling. It's...confusing. Is this love? Or lust? Is it just some weird funk that will pass or has it always been here inside my messed up brain?"

Maura doesn't answer. Jane shifts onto her side, laying her head down on her pillow and unabashedly staring at how the orange and red lights start to colour Maura's face.

"And I wish I could speak to you about it. Cause you'd know exactly what to say. What I should do. How to make me feel better. But I can't tell you anything, can I?" Jane mutters defeatedly.

Jane thinks about the art gallery. She knows that if she had enough talent, she would paint this very image and put it on display for everyone to see.

Beside her head, Maura's hand lies open. Fingers outstretched and palm facing upwards, almost in invitation. Jane wants to fit her fingers through that hand. But she doesn't.

She heaves herself up and crawls out of the tent. Stretching and cracking her joints, she stands and shuffles to the window. The sun stains the horizon and bloody red. It chases away the night. Below her, Boston is still. Boston is waking.

Boston is beautiful.

But even so, she thinks, clutching the window sill and feeling her blood thudding in her wrists and head.

Not as gorgeous as Maura.


	10. Brown Eyes I Hold You Near

We are creeping closer to the end... three chapters and an epilogue after this!

* * *

Maura argued that this would be the most efficient and realistic way, in spite of the heated protest from Jane.

Still, a disappointed frown from Maura and suddenly she was agreeing wholeheartedly.

Jane sits hunched forward, her arms crossed over her chest, every inch the huffing toddler. Maura is driving her to the outskirts of Boston, to one of the forests which sprawl the countryside. It doesn't help her mood that at Maura's insistence, she has a black scarf blind folded over her eyes.

"Are we there yet?"

A weary sigh. "You know that we aren't, Jane."

Jane drops her head back against the headrest, lolling it from side to side. "Can't we get there any faster? This car is boiling hot!"

Maura reaches over and twiddles the dials for the air conditioning. A gust of cool air gusts at Jane's face.

"Woah! No, woah, hold on here. We just need to calm this puppy down," Jane gasps, her hair blowing in all directions as she blindly pats the dashboard and window, looking for the vent.

She can hear Maura's snorts and giggles of mirth in the background. "Shut up!" she complains, finally finding the vent and adjusting it accordingly.

"I'm sure you'll be pleased to know we have arrived," Maura quips, parking the car and undoing her seatbelt.

Jane mumbles something sarcastic and incoherent while Maura rounds the car to open the door for her. Jane remembers watching Bambi for the first time, sniggering at the little fawn trying to walk on twig-like legs. She isn't laughing at it ever again; the blindfold makes a baby deer out of her as she attempts to get out of the car.

Once she is standing steady, Jane's arms gravitate upwards, hands outstretched as she tries to feel for something. The silence confuses her. "Maura? You still there?"

Maura puts her hand on Jane's shoulder. The detective jerks in surprise under her hand. "I'm here. I'm going to lead you into the entrance of the forest, and then I'll go, okay?"

Jane nods. The gravel path from the parking area crunches under their feet, and then fade to soft thumps on the dry dirt path.

Though she can't see anything, Jane does notice the change in lighting. They push on for about a minute. The singing of the birds is so much louder, like they are perched right on her shoulder. The rustling leaves are like bristling sandpaper. Jane marvels at how sensitive her other senses have been since she was blindfolded.

Or maybe Maura's touch always inspired such internal heat?

Eventually they come to a jilted halt. Maura's hand falls away. Jane craves its return.

"I'm going to for now. I'll be waiting for you in the park on the other side of the forest," Maura explains; and then, teasingly. "Try not to get lost."

"Are you doubting my mad navigation skills, doctor?" Jane retorts.

Maura's laugh carries on the breeze, growing father away. Jane waits about thirty seconds, then unties the scarf from around her eyes. She blinks at the stark brightness, even when she stands in the shade of the tall trees around her.

She is alone.

Seeing the entrance off to her right, Jane starts in the opposite direction. She drapes the light scarf over her shoulders. The clear path and fresh air bring a calmness to her. She knows this walk is the prime opportunity to sift through the internal chaos that rages on in her mind.

When she first realised she was attracted to Maura, holding each other as they drunkenly staggered to the coroner's front door, Jane has been involved in constant clashes between her head and her heart. Ever since that night, she has mostly listened to her head, but the natural elements free of urbanisation and the conflict of the fast paced city make her consider differently.

She cranes her head up at the high trees, sees the movements of birds. Above that, the blue Boston sky reigns. She smiles.

"Okay, heart. I'm listening. Tell me what I need to know."

She sets off with a new determination and all ears open.

* * *

A boy throws a ball back and forth with his mother. His squeals of delight ripple in the summer air. Their little golden retriever puppy yelps and leaps in the air, trying to grab the ball in its mouth.

The sun is beating down on Massachusetts. Attracting families and couples alike down to the park which resides on the edge of the forest. There are intermingling jingles from multiple ice creams vans. There's the laughter of children and the occasional buzz of a passing bumblebee.

And reclining in the shade of an enormous oak tree is Maura Isles.

She pushes the aviators a little further up her nose. Her legs are crossed at the ankle in front of her, one hand behind her supports her weight. The other reaches down to draw abstract patterns on the tartan blanket stretched below her.

It has been around an hour and a half since Maura dropped Jane off on the other side of the forest. In that time she has found the ideal spot for their picnic, threw a Frisbee back to two little boys after it had landed on her blanket, and managed to squeeze in a calm meditation session.

Overall, Maura should be feeling fantastic.

But she isn't. Because something is missing.

She sighs in frustration at herself, and the fact that she doesn't feel whole any more until Jane is at her side. She feels like a delicious apple where a worm has wiggled inside or an over-zealous chef has been too lenient with the corer. Everything looks brilliant from the outside, but inside, she's beginning to rot.

Maura leans farther back, reclining on her elbows and tilting her head back to stare up through the waving branches of the oak tree. When did Jane's absence start to feel like she was suffocating? Since when did simple attraction morph into pulsating cravings?

She scoffs. "Pathetic," she hisses.

 _That's that I am. No better than a silly little school girl in love.._

Maura bolts upright, knocking her aviators to her end of her nose.

 _Oh God, I'm truly in love with her._

 _I mean I thought I...but this is..._

Her ribs contract and her throat dries up and no air gets into her lungs. Around her the sunny park begins to spin.

 _Panic attack._

She tries to calm her heart rate, tries to ground herself in the fresh oasis of the park, the cool sanctuary of the shade from the oak tree.

She takes the flask of lemonade, still chilled, and places it on her forehead. She lowers herself backwards, laying flat and allowing her limbs to go limp. Flat on her back, she waits until the lurches of nausea and dizziness stop, and the seizing of her breathing is quelled. She inhales the fresh air greedily.

 _This frightens me_ , she thinks, resigned. _The way that I feel for her- how deeply I feel for her. It scares me so._

At the line of trees the dark green ferns and pines meet the bright shades of lush, sun-touched grass. And that is where Jane Rizzoli strides out from the shadow of the forest.

Maura turns her head to focus on her. Lean muscles slinking across the park, smiling at kids that toss a Frisbee across her path. She is both the vibrant warmth of the first spring sun after a frigid, lengthy winter and the relief of the cool shower after an arid summer's day.

She walks through the park like she owns it. Her possessiveness fixes and holds Maura's stare on her, no matter how much the doctor might want to politely divert her attention.

Eventually, finding Maura lying under the ancient oak tree, Jane reaches the edge of the blanket and slips off her boots before dropping down beside her. She balls the black scarf up in her hands and tosses it down between the pair. And then she stretches out flat, crossing her ankles and putting her hands under her head. Wears a silly grin.

Maura is murderously envious of what put it there.

"You appear to be happy," she notes.

Jane shrugs, smirking up at the rustling leaves high above her. "Just some thinking is all."

Maura sees red. But she smiles meekly, trying not to grind her teeth. "May I ask what about?"

Jane looks at her then. "Nah. It's a secret," she teases. Seeing Maura's face contort into badly concealed hurt, Jane backpedals. "It was...I just had to clear my head. Get myself straight on a few things, y'know?"

Maura purses her lips. "And in clarity, you have found happiness?" It is too simple to correlate.

Jane turns her attention to the golden retriever puppy bounding after the little boy.

"Nah," she murmurs, as the tiny yellow haired dog yips and jumps clumsily, to the boy's delight.

"In happiness, I've found clarity."

* * *

On the drive back from the park, Jane noticed the dark clouds creeping up the sky from the horizon. She snorted lightly in disdain. Typical that such a beautiful day would be ruined by rain.

By the time they got into the city streets again, Boston looming up around them, everything was grey and dull. A far cry from the bright park.

Now she scowls at the windscreen, aggravated by the weather. The first patters of rain splatter the car. She smacks at the control to turn on the window wipers. Maura shakes her head and continues to stare up at the rolling grey clouds that glower above them.

Jane lets her mind analyse the last few weeks. This bucketlist has brought them much closer, there is no doubt about that. However, whether that's closer to each other or closer to the edge of control is another thing entirely.

Maura leans her head back, letting the cushion of the headrest support her. She closes her eyes. Jane glances at her, and assumes that she is listening to the tapping of the rain and the purring of the engine. It seems to be that she and Jane have been inching closer not to each other as their bond deepens. As their friendship warps. Crawling to the line that they silently agreed never to cross.

Like a barrier erected in each other's mind as they lay in bed alone at night and contemplated the consequences of their attractions.

Jane continues to sneak glimpses of Maura, quietly reclining in the seat beside her. She slows to a stop at a red light and relaxes, releasing a sigh. Through the splashing rainfall and the concrete greys of the city street, the red glow appears to be the only thing with colour.

Jane tilts her head back slightly. It's like when she's elbow deep in a case with no leads. When her mother is hounding her about whatever this week's reasons is. When Cavanaugh is on her back. When Crowe won't stop sneering at her; and yet Maura is a breath of fresh air. A relief. A weight off her shoulders. She shines out through gloom, a gliding light. Perfection in a rough and tumble world. Someone she trusts completely and can share any burden with. Can share any secret with.

Everything except how Jane feels about her.

A disgruntled blare from a horn behind her startles her, and she realises the light has turned green. She jumps the car forward, and hears a snort of amusement from beside her.

"Are you alright? You seem a little distracted, Jane," Maura asks. Her eyes are still closed, but her tone is light and there's a faint smile still on her lips.

Jane scowls. "Fine," she grumbles, blushing nonetheless.

The dreary background of the heavy downpour doesn't do much to dampen the warmth that spreads through Jane's insides as she resumes thinking about the bucketlist. Everything from the way they fell so easily into the facade of a couple at the LGBT rally. The way Jane had drunkenly serenaded her at the window like some female, Boston Romeo in the early hours. How they had danced together when they crashed the wedding after seeing Carmen at the opera.

God, she longs for them not to pretend any more. She bites her cheek until tears form; its all she can do not to tell Maura exactly what she wants. And _how_ she wants it.

Her stomach cramps. She shifts her hips in her seat.

Now her mind is somewhere else entirely.

"We're here, Maura," Jane says, parking the car on the kerb outside of Jane's apartment building.

Maura's upper lip curls in disgust as she looks out into the bleak wet evening. Since it had been such a beautiful morning and afternoon, they had dressed for sun, and despite how she insisted on preparedness for all occasions, she is definitely under prepared for this.

She turns towards Jane, who raises her eyebrows at the rain. It is truly battering the car now.

"Thank you for driving back. I think lying in the afternoon sun too long is what made me feel so drowsy," Maura admits. "But I'm okay to drive home."

Jane looks over, smiling softly and nodding. But she doesn't make a move to leave the car. Maura fidgets.

"Jane?"

"Yup?"

"Not that I don't love your company, but shouldn't you be getting out now?"

"Yup. Probably."

Still, she doesn't move.

Maura sighs, trying to keep her polite tone intact. "Jane, please. I would like to get home at some point this evening."

"I get it, Maura." Jane turns off the engine and slides the keys out, jangling them in her hand. She flashes a wicked grin at a perplexed Maura. "But you aren't gonna get far without the keys, are you?"

Maura squeals indignantly as Jane swings open the door and leaps out. She splashes onto the wet street and shoves the door shut. Maura looks out form the windscreen through the running water in horror.

Jane Rizzoli practically dances on the wet pavement, daring the doctor to contest her. Snapping off her seatbelt, Maura chases Jane out onto the street, giggling even as they both get drenched.

Hair sticking to their heads in soaked parts, the two laugh and jeer at each other as they run around the parked car like children. Two Boston professionals. But neither care how it looks exactly. They only know that their skin is ablaze despite the pelting of the ice water plastered their clothes to their skin.

And eventually Maura catches up to Jane, no matter how much she tries to squirm her way out of Maura's reach. She snatches the keys from the detective's grasp, but stumbles, sending them both thudding onto the hood of the Prius.

They pant because they try to catch their breath; or maybe because they're so shocked at the sudden proximity of each other's bodies.

Jane wants to check if their impact has done any damage to Maura's car. But the heat of Maura's stomach and breasts and thighs against her through their sodden clothes has killed any brain function.

"I'd better go," Maura whispers, her eyes locked on Jane's lips.

 _Kissing in the rain. The beautiful cliché._ Jane swallows as she watches a rain drop slide its way down Maura's freckled nose.

"Yeah," she murmurs, hoarse and husky like the answer to a different question.

Though it looks completely mechanical and unnatural to do so, Maura forces herself away from Jane. She waves to her awkwardly before rounding her car and opening the driver's side. Jane backtracks away from the car, almost tripping on the kerb.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Maura calls weakly. She stands for a moment, as if waiting for Jane to do something else. Jane's mind still telling her to run up to Maura. Plant her lips on Maura's. Wrap her hands in soaking wet tendrils.

Maura ducks her head and gets in the car.

"I guess," Jane replies lamely, her skin starting to numb from the onslaught of the rain. She waves at Maura as the doctor starts the car and pulls away from the kerb. Ignoring the way the body is now shivering from the chill, Jane watches her go the whole way down to the end of the street.

Jane imagines what is going through Maura's mind. She knows that the car seats will have to be dried. That her shirt is probably ruined forever. But Jane wishes that she wouldn't care. That she is clutching the steering wheel and driving, thinking all the time about turning around and returning to Jane's arms.

But Jane knows Maura. Knows that Maura wouldn't dare let herself be tempted by the fantasy of kissing Jane Rizzoli in the pouring rain.

Jane doesn't have that kind of self control.

The rain starts to make her head throb. Constant icy rain pelting off her skull might do that.

She squints her eyes and turns for the steps to her apartment, trudging morosely towards them.

And then an idea.

She bolts for the front door.

* * *

As soon as Jane crashes through her apartment door, she is running for the legal pad in the bedroom. Grabbing it, she smacks it down on the kitchen table and clicks on the light, seeing as the weather has made it so dark.

The water droplets drip from the ends of her hair, and her clothing is sticking damply to her body but she doesn't care.

She stands back for a second, hesitating. Anxiously, she spins and turns the ballpoint pen in her hand.

Once she touches the pen to the paper, there's no stopping her.

Her high school English teacher would be damn proud.

 _My voice is gone and lost;_

 _choked somewhere between_

' _God, it's raining' and_

' _God, marry me...'_

The muscles in Jane's forearm are on fire as she writes, unable to get the words out fast enough. As far as she's concerned, with the full body throb she's experiencing, these words travel straight from heart to limb to page.

 _Ice touches the back of my neck_

 _Chilled rainwater in seductive slivers_

Even in the meagre glow of the kitchen lights overhead, even with the dull grey rain pattering away outside, the room seems bright and heavy and alive. The current is electric.

 _Twisting their way under my collar,_

 _Cooling the heat of my skin_

She clenches her jaw until her teeth creak just so she can hold back the ecstatic yell perched in her throat, ready to pounce out. It would shatter the silence, and perhaps startle awake poor, old Mrs. Chekovsky upstairs. So she forces it down, but it refuses to go.

 _Numbing my spine as she numbs my mind..._

Images pour into her head; little things like snapshots and smells and tastes. How Maura' perfume would tickle her nose in amongst the odour of cut grass and sugary lemonade as they lounged on the blanket in the park that afternoon.

The disapproving glint in Maura's hazel eyes- the tincture golden in the sunlight- when Jane made a joke out of some super scientific word she couldn't pronounce.

The way the frigid rain had beaten at her skin and yet she would have stood there for hours if she were still there with Maura.

Jane thinks about how she would have liked the night to end if she had her way. She would have closed most of the distance between them...

 _The darkness of her eyes_

 _Sing exactly what she wants_

The fantasy plays out in Jane's mind. She lets her eyes flutter shut for a moment. She rests her hands flat on the counter, now wet with rainwater. Her heart tightens painfully and she gasps at the thought of Maura pulling her face down into the kiss that would seal their fate for a lifetime.

 _She knows what I'll do_

 _Blue lips part in invitation_

 _Cold nipping oxygen from them_

 _Like lust takes away my fear_

Jane can practically taste Maura's lips against her own. Unconsciously, her tongue darts out and swipes her bottom lip.

 _I kiss her._

She jots it down, the words mumbled under her breath as she scrambles to note them.

Her poem, technically, is complete; scribbles and scores and all.

But she is not spent.

She rips a page off of the legal pad and begins again, retelling the same stories with different words, memories, times and emotions. But the meaning remains.

She is painfully in love with Maura Isles. She's bursting at the seams. She's desperate for the opportunity to convey her feelings but she doesn't know how. But she knows that she is getting closer to the day that she will. She wishes she knew the date, she'd mark it on every calender in sight.

But she still doesn't _know how._

So she continues to write.

And she doesn't stop until she is a long way into the night.


	11. Just Let Love Consume Us

You're all stars. All of you. Here we go; the beginning of the end. Reviews, reviews, reviews, por favor!

* * *

Maura is frowning at the results in her hand.

A slow, bitter exhale of disappointment deflates her. These results didn't match anyone in the police database. Another dashed hope.

She shuffles the papers back into shape. Taps them twice on her desk and slotting them back inside their folder. Standing, she tucks the folder under her arm and moves towards the door. She intends to give them to Jane. But just in her peripheral vision she sees the morgue technicians signing off on another body.

It is transferred onto the table, and the two technicians share a laugh as they wave the delivery men out. It is likely to be a medical failure or a natural death, as she was not called out to the scene.

Biting her bottom lip, she weighs up the options in her head; perform the autopsy now and risk missing Jane at her lunch break, or go up to the bullpen, where the sense of banter and warmth would make her reluctant to return to the chilled, chemical stench of the morgue.

Of course, the purely magnetic nature of Jane's aura would make it extremely difficult for her to leave anyway.

Maura makes her decision, returning the files to her desk before slipping her suit jacket off of her shoulders and draping it over the back of her desk chair.

In three minutes, she is in her black scrubs, tightening the strings of the pants. She figures it would be smart to kill two birds with one stone, as Jane would say, by texting her friend to come down for the results while she continued with the autopsy. The expression makes her think of Jane.

"Why would you attempt to dispatch a bird with a stone anyway?" Maura wonders aloud, reaching across her neatly arranged desk for her mobile. "It isn't the most effective method, especially in the modern age. It would certainly require an impressive level of accuracy and velocity..."

Tapping out a quick text, Maura pulls her luscious hair back into a ponytail, and snaps on a pair of sky blue surgical gloves. Just before she makes for the door, the reply chirps.

 _On my way!_

Maura's throat dries and the office colours seem so much brighter. The masks on the wall could almost be smiling down at her. It never fails to astound her how one person can make her whole perception shift.

Stepping through to the morgue, Maura meets the two technicians. They are already working to set up the tools and monitors necessary for the autopsy. They are both relatively young; one a sandy haired woman and the other a taller, broadly framed man.

"Good morning, Dan, Naomi," she greets warmly, fiddling with the edge of her rubber glove.

The pair grin at her. "Morning, Dr Isles," Dan says cheerily, rolling his shoulders as he adjusts the tray of tools. "Everything is pretty much ready to rock.

Maura smiles fondly at him. "Thank you."

When Maura Isles first took the position as Chief Medical Examiner, she was a strictly private, and subsequently lonely, individual. She rarely, if ever, spoke to her colleagues outside of a rigorously professional capacity.

But, as her friendship with Jane and her relationship with the other BPD staff progressed, Maura felt more comfortable and confident in herself and others to engage in idle chat. The Ice Queen began to thaw. Sometimes even, dare she acknowledge it, she engages in harmless banter.

Yes, there is no doubt Maura Isles became a little more human thanks to Jane.

 _Just another thing on a long list to thank her for._

That is why she doesn't feel the least bit perturbed as she clasps her hands in front of her and asks, "How was your weekend?"

Naomi chokes, her sandy haired ponytail swinging as she shakes her head. "Better to be left untouched, Dr Isles."

Maura's eyebrows rise. "I hope you kept _hydrated_ , Naomi," she replies cryptically.

Dan's grin grows and his eyes sparkle with humour. It makes him look barely old enough to graduate high school. "Oh, she was plenty hydrated, Doc."

He hisses at the sharp jab that Naomi delivers to his ribs. They may be colleagues but they have a close friendship and a bond which Maura feels relieved and proud she can relate to.

The morgue door flies open as Jane Rizzoli bounds into the room. Maura's eyes fly down to the tool set automatically, checking each instrument is where it should be. Mostly out of fear that if she didn't then her eyes would be glued to the sinful, blood red button down that Jane chose to wear today.

Unbeknown to either Jane or Maura, the two lab technicians notice the rapid appearance of tension in the room. They wink and snigger at each other before stealthily exiting the room.

"Hey," Jane says thickly.

"Hello, Jane," Maura replies, rather too brightly.

When did it become so difficult to speak to her best friend?

Oh yes, she remembers; around the time she fell in love with her.

"Sorry I haven't been down recently. This case is kicking our asses upstairs. Cavanaugh is acting like someone kicked his puppy," Jane grumbles.

Maura grimaces at the image, but nods sharply. "I understand, Jane. This sudden occurrence of such a unique case with so few leads makes it easy to empathise with your frustration."

Jane swings her arms loosely at her sides. "Yeah well... speaking of, you got those results handy?"

Maura gestures with a rubber tipped finger at the door to her office. "On my desk."

 _Just where I'd love to have you naked and writhing, gasping as I take you...possess you as my own._

The medical examiner distracts herself as best she can from Jane's sashaying hips long enough to give a mellow warning, "It isn't good news, I'm afraid."

Jane reappears, folder open in her hands. She wears the same creased mask of disappointment that Maura knows she herself was wearing only minutes before.

"Damn, I really thought we were on to something here," Jane laments.

Maura straightens a scalpel unnecessarily. "I'm sorry, Jane."

Jane looks up at the mewling, wounded tone. She flaps the folder shut and chucks it on the steel countertop next to the sink before sauntering over to Maura. She gently grasps her elbows.

"Hey, it isn't your fault, okay?" Jane says lowly but firmly, meeting tentative, unsure hazel eyes with her own. "So the DNA got no matches. That's okay. There'll be a lead or something that will come up soon. But you haven't let anyone down, Maura."

Maura feels like she is hollow inside, but with each inhale of Jane's scented body lotion her skin is set aflame.

"Thank you, Jane."

Jane winks, pulling back but not breaking contact with the blonde. "You got it. And besides, your poetry thing is tomorrow night, right?"

Maura nods. "Yes. You're still coming with me, aren't you?"

Jane hesitates. Alarm bells ring in Maura's head. If it were possible that Jane possessed the willpower to take one of those super shiny scalpels, slit them across her wrists and drain herself dry here and now, she looks like she would consider it. But she doesn't.

Jane pulls a Chelsea grin, fake and beaming, full of promise.

"Nothing would stop me being there, Maura. Not one thing," Jane assures.

Maura doesn't believe her.

* * *

It has been less of a day and more of a war.

At least, that's what the boneache that has settled in tells her.

Maura stands on the roof of BPD in the twilight, her hair lifting and dropping elegantly with the light breeze. In the twilight, the horizon is burning with flaming oranges and fiery reds. Further up, the night drifts into an inky purple, and then the void that is the jet black night sky.

She places her hands on the low wall in front of her, letting her hands feel every piece of grit that litters the surface of the concrete. She breathes in through her nose and out through her mouth, trying to let the day drain out of her. But it remains, like an insect buzzing around her ears that she tries to take a swipe at but can't manage.

Maura knew from the moment her feet hit her bedroom floor this morning that it was going to be _one of those days_. Where all the detectives are pushy and frustrated, taking it out on the lab technicians and all of those that hold a lower status. Even though she hates to admit it, Jane does it too. Despite the fact they were amiable this afternoon, things deteriorated.

It hurts when she gets barked at by her friend just because she can't hurry up the chemical processes any more, but she can just about empathise with the aggravated detectives, so eventually this hurt eases.

And as this thought moves through her conscience, she gets a text from Jane.

 _Sorry I was an asshole today. This case is kicking our asses. Can I make it up to you? Dinner ... sometime when we have the time. :) ?_

And then a second buzz.

 _Pleeeaasseee? I'll even buy you something...green. I'll even eat something green. Your choice._

Maura's lips quirk into a knowing smile, but she doesn't reply just yet, tucking her phone back into her coat pocket.

She just continues to breathe in the evening air, letting it soothe the inflictions and stress of the day as much as she can. Up here, clarity prevails.

Below her, the noise of the street is contained and reduced to nothing more than a distant thrum of traffic, some horn beeps no louder than a text tone. Beyond the skyline is the harbour, and then the sea. And back to the horizon.

Beyond that?

Oblivion, Maura suspects, though every scientific bone in her body protests adamantly at this poetic but ultimately hollow conclusion.

It should be the perfect place to let the day and the world fall away. Lock everything away in a box for safe keeping and let herself exist in a world of _nothing_ if even for a few minutes.

But there is still that insect with its vibrating buzz in her ears.

She takes the piece of folded paper out of her other coat pocket, unfolds it and smooths it against the surface of the concrete wall. Her bucketlist has one item that she wasn't ever sure she would really find the right moment to do.

To write down her regrets and burn them. Therapeutic, she had heard.

Now that she's up here with her list, cultivated over a series of weeks, she knows that now is as good a time as she'll ever get. Every spare moment of inspiration was spent scribbling down strings of words and phrases. All to bring her to this very moment.

In the dying light of this mind-numbing day, Maura reads over the list one more time. She scans down the twenty three items. By the time she reaches the most recent, she feels nauseous. Disbelief at the fact she can reduce some of the worst, darkest periods of her life down to ink on a page. Self-disgust gurgles in her gut.

 _Not telling Angela Rizzoli how appreciated she is often enough_

 _Voting for Bill Clinton upon my return from Israel in 1992_

 _Staying away from Boston as long as I had_

 _Getting involved with Garret Fairfield_

 _Not kissing Jane as we stood in the pouring rain_

She digs around in her bag, finally retrieving a lighter. She doesn't smoke, but she knows that it is better to be prepared for every strange occasion and possible scenario. A lighter is incredibly practical.

Maura holds the piece of paper up in one hand. With the other she flicks on the lighter and brings the sparking flame to the edge of the list.

The flames lick up their side of the page first, the heat radiating onto her face and the brightness blurring away the rest of the dark twilight from her line of vision. The smoky, ashen smell swirls up her nostrils, making them flare with disgust.

As the paper curls in on itself, blackening further as the fire consumes it, Maura considers her life as it is. This is a lamp, helping to illuminate her days. And she feels like she's waking up.

How could she not have realised how much chronic pain she is in? This back and forth with Jane, sending mixed signals but hiding behind walls; pretending everything is fine when she absolutely isn't. She can't do this anymore.

The realisation is frank. It makes the emotion throb in her gut, stinging behind her eyes.

Her fingertips start to tingle. The flames are creeping closer. The sensation intensifies into a blistering burn, and that's when she finally throws the page out over the side of the roof, the darkness dashing it away.

She wraps her arms around her waist and watches the embers flutter into the dying light of sunset, the purples darkening with every minute she stands there.

Somewhere, it is midnight.

And somewhere it is dawn.

* * *

The wind is unforgiving tonight. Stars and moon are all out, yet the icy chill that the wind brings takes away the nocturnal beauty.

Jane is watching Maura, because she has yet to show thorugh the BPD doors. Her heart is hammering. She tries to will her feet out of the lobby but she hasn't managed it just yet. Maura has been waiting for exactly seventeen minutes in the plummeting temperatures for Jane.

Maura tugs her coat collar up around her neck. Jane feels a pang of sympathy for her. Since when was September so cold? Jane imagines that Maura's mind trawls through numerical data from the weather records of the last century.

The medical examiner appears set on heading up to the homicide bullpen when the doors to BPD crash open.

 _Here we go, Rizzoli. This could be the last conversation of your friendship, so make it a good one._

A breathless Jane thunders down the steps to Maura's side.

"Hey," she gasps, bending over slightly and wincing at the obvious stitch in her side. "You get my texts?"

"Hello, Jane," Maura replies curtly, not so subtly indicating the watch adorning her wrist.

"Ah, Maura," Jane complains softly, moving the bottom of her blazer away from where it gets caught on her holster. She can't stand herself for what she has to say, knowing how it will hurt Maura.

"It's okay. I'm sure you can make it up to me. Didn't you mention something about greens…?"

Breathing in feels like there's jagged glass in her throat.

"Listen, I know that you've got your poetry thing tonight," Jane starts. She despises the way that her voice sounds weak and hoarse.

It is pathetic.

Maura's features brighten.

Jane hates herself more.

"Yeah, I know I said I'd go with you, but Korsak and the boys just hauled a guy upstairs and I gotta, y'know..." Jane rushes, jerking a thumb over her shoulder.

Maura's expression disintegrates. Crumbles.

Jane desperately wants to retract that statement. Shout _surprise!_ and _Just kidding!_

But she can't. So she bites the inside of her cheek until a flare of sharp pain flourishes in her mouth and a metallic tang erupts.

"Oh," is all Maura manages, her eyes flickering downwards.

Then, like an anxiety-riddled teenager, Jane begins flapping and fumbling with her blazer. Paper crackles, as its whipped into the air and clumsily waved towards Maura.

After getting a piece of paper virtually shoved into her hands, Maura's apparent hurt eases into puzzlement.

Jane licks her lips twice but they're still as dry as the back of her throat and she is _sure_ she's about to screw this up. Maura's eyebrows scrunch up.

 _God she's adorable._

"Jane," Maura says, a question which hangs on as a silent attachment. The doctor doesn't elaborate. Doesn't need to. The inquiry booms in Jane's head, while Maura continues to turn the folded, dog-eared piece of paper over and over in her dainty hands. It has ripples, like it has been previously wet and then dried up.

Jane feels like if she speaks, she'll choke. Or vomit. Or sob. Or all three.

Maura looks up. She's open and genuine and _so there_. Jane is melting inside and out like wax at a flame.

"Jane?" Maura utters, eyes all concern and adoration. Still tainted with hurt.

"Okay, hear me out," Jane practically barks, the phantom hand tightening around her throat. "I knew that there was a chance that we were gonna nail this perp today and I wouldn't make your thing tonight. And I felt like an ass and..."

Jane glances at the piece of paper in Maura's hand. The doctor is clutching it tightly to her chest as Jane gushes her lines. She looks like a lost child with a teddy bear.

Like she's anticipating Jane is going to hurt her further and the paper will bring protection and comfort.

"What is this, Jane?" Maura whispers, never looking away from Jane's face.

"It's..." Her voice catches. Her blood pressure skyrockets as her confidence plummets. She wants the ground to shift and fall away beneath her feet. "It's mine. My...my poem..."

"Your poem?" Maura parrots. "I didn't know you wrote poetry..." She moves to unfolded the paper.

"No!" Jane shouts, startling both of them. She glances around in chagrin, hoping that she didn't attract any unwanted attention.

She steps closer, though it feels like she's about to die. She lowers her voice.

"It's mine, yes. And I...I'm really bummed I can't make it tonight. I swear I am," Jane placates. Her hands reach up, fussing at her shirt collar and hair. She is a downhill train with no brakes. "I-I'm sure you've already picked something highbrow and fancy to read, and _way_ better, or maybe you've even written something yourself, so-"

"Absolutely, yes," Maura answers quietly.

Jane's jaw clicks shut. The conversation enters disarray. She narrows her eyes.

"Wait...so?" She is bursting with love and adrenaline and terror that she's about to be brutally kicked in the teeth by the gentlest woman on earth.

"Yes. I'll read your poem tonight, if that was what you were trying to ask," Maura provides airily. She again tries to unfold it, but a panicked cough that comes from Jane makes her pause, so she slips it instead into the safety of her coat pocket. "If I cannot read it now, may I at least know what it is about?"

 _You. Your beauty. Your strength. Your intelligence. Your brilliance. My love for you and all that you are._

 _My prayer that one day, in some world, I will have you and you will have me. I as yours and you as mine._

 _Forever._

Jane snorts. _Who am I kidding? I am hers now in this world and that won't change anytime soon._

"Nope. Secret. Anyway," Jane segues, tapping at the watch on her wrist. "Hate to be a bitch and all..."

Maura's hand settles on Jane's shoulder and a sad but understanding smile graces her face.

Jane wants to kiss her.

"I understand. Go do your job, detective," Maura teases. She gives Jane's shoulder an affectionate squeeze.

Jane _really_ wants to kiss her.

But she doesn't. She trades goodbyes and good lucks with Maura and then she bolts back into the Boston precinct.

The elevator is empty and she is relieved. As soon as the doors drift shut she's leaning her forehead against the mirrored glass and gently banging her head on it.

She wants to scream and jump and vomit and curl up in a ball and book a ticket to Hong Kong as fast as possible. It takes a long time for her hands to stop shaking to badly. She knows she needs to pull herself together if she's going to go and interview a suspect. She searches inside for that cool poker-face.

But it is stuck underneath a deep sea of realisation about what she has just accomplished. No matter what, there's no turning back now. With a single piece of paper, she may have just kick-started the greatest love affair she'll ever be a part of, or destroyed the single greatest friendship that she has ever had.

A catalyst _for_ the heart or a dagger _to_ the heart.

 _Ironic._

The doors ping open at the homicide floor. She will get a strong cup of coffee and then break the suspect. There is nothing else she can do now but wait. A phonecall, and late night visit, a text, a next day confrontation. Something.

And her whole body is trembling now.

She _needs_ that coffee.

The logo on the coffee machine catches her eye. She doesn't know why it does. She has passed this machine every day, uses it most days, and yet here she is now noticing it with brand new eyes.

Jane gets a shiver over her skin. the kind that comes when someone realises they have seen something every day but never really _looked_ at it. And now that they finally do it looks absolutely alien to you. Foreign. Something new and out of place.

It is her only distraction from the lifestyle that she is slowly getting used to being a part of in every waking moment of her daily life;

Being in love with Maura Isles.

* * *

 _Got him._

That's all the text is. Two words. But it says so much more.

But Maura doesn't have the time to contemplate it all. Because her name is being called and then she's taking unsteady steps towards the stage.

The gathering is cosier than she expected but no less daunting. She tries to imagine that the whole thing is some sort of seminar at a science convention. Perhaps a symposium upstate; but of course she knows it isn't. The stage lights are scalding on her skin and she hopes that the sweat doesn't shine too much on her forehead. She clears her throat.

"Good evening, I'm Maura and I'll be reading, umm-" She buries trembling fingers into her pocket, retrieving the folded poem that Jane had handed her. She tries not to accidentally rip the paper as she hastily unfolds it and leans back in towards the microphone. " _Rainy Vision_ by Jane Rizzoli."

Some of the immediate audience members nod their heads in anticipation. But beyond the first row, the stage lights have blurred everyone into a dark oblivion.

She knows she should have taken the poem out and read it beforehand. Prepared the perfect places to break for air. Practise how to make certain lines flow like they should. Yet out of respect for Jane, she didn't.

Inhaling deeply, Maura begins to read the lines on the crumpled paper, which are scribbled and scrawled and look like they were taken down only in the greatest of rushes.

 _My voice is gone and lost;_

 _Choked somewhere between_

' _God it's raining' and_

' _God, marry me...'_

Maura's breath hitches in her throat. A micropause. Those in the audience probably think that it's a natural break in the stanzas.

To Maura it's like a deafening screech of brakes.

She continues, her voice rising a pitch or two as she panics about stumbling over the words and panics about the meaning of the words and panics because her mind is trying to work and analyse and pick apart the lines even as she tries to hold it all together and get through the damn performance.

 _Outside, everything is numbness and frozen_

 _Dead trees in winter and ice packs on sports injuries_

 _But inside I'm a war_

 _And for heaven's sake she's gonna win_

Maura didn't want to let herself believe, but now she can't quite ignore the thickening of her blood. The way the beaming lights aren't the only reason that her skin is roasting all over. This poem is about how she and Jane chased each other through the rain like children and still their attraction never dimmed.

It grew. It spilled. Spilled over onto paper.

And this is the result.

It's the prettiest stain she's ever seen.

Though she is reading each of the rapidly recorded words on this piece of paper, Jane's air is rasping the words in her ears. This is the purest form of Jane Rizzoli's heart that Maura has been able to experience.

It feels sacred.

And she continues through line after line. Some of them make her knees threaten to buckle under her because the thought that Jane is indirectly confessing all of this to Maura is overwhelming.

And by the time she reaches the last verse, she is ready to drop the paper, leap from the small stage and run the whole five and a half miles from this corner cafe to Jane's apartment building.

 _She knows what I'll do_

 _Blue lips part in invitation_

 _Cold nipping oxygen from them_

 _Like lust takes away my fear_

Maura's throat closes up. She reads the last three words over and over, but her mouth locks and she can't seem to say them aloud. The audience murmur in the silence. Builds the anticipation for her. If possible, her cheeks flush further.

She closes her eyes and forces herself to relax, leaning closer to the microphone.

"I kiss her," she whispers.

And nothing. No more words.

The buzzing of the stage lights, set up especially for Tuesday nights when an open mic poetry workshop gathers. A few far off clicks of glass beakers and coffee mugs as the baristas tidy tables. A toddler gurgles, their single father unable to find a babysitter and having to bring them along.

And then rapturous applause.

Maura opens her eyes and exhales slowly, relief fizzling through her veins, spreading from her head and chest.

She isn't sure how her unsteady legs make it back to her seat, but they do. Afterwards, people shake her hand and pat her shoulder and enthusiastically praise her. They tell her they loved it. They tell her they cried. A young girl with a quiet voice but a wide smile tells Maura she related more to that poem that she thinks she could use words to express.

And after all of that, when she politely turns down the offers for a drink and accepts the invitation to return in the future, Maura stands on the street corner, leaning against a lamppost, dizzy.

 _I kiss her._

"I wish you had," Maura whispers, still clutching the paper tightly in her fist. Fist pressed to her breastbone.

Breastbone proving no match for her heart.

"I wish you had."


	12. The Sky Is Caving In

_I'm pretty sure Maura would never walk to work but it's a plot device okay? Okay!_

 _Well, no fun to tease you any longer..._

* * *

 _Wednesday morning_

It is the first true day of fall.

Yes, technically autumn and the turning of the seasons had already begun. But this is the very first day where the subtle changes are suddenly so vulgar and stark. They seem to have happened overnight.

And so Maura, slinging her beige coat over her arm as she locks her front door, decides that the hint of chill on the breeze and the kaleidoscope of flaming colours on the sidewalk are too good not to fully appreciate.

She has left early enough so that she has time to walk to the precinct, which is quite a journey. With the case coming to a probable close after Jane's simple text last night, she expects to have a lighter day of work.

That being said, evil never sleeps. She could get a call at any moment informing her that a murder was committed as she lay asleep last night, cocooned in her duvet and dreaming of a lover.

 _Jane._

Her fist tightens on her briefcase handle. One name sparks a chain reaction inside. Her stomach squeezes as she recalls her latest lustful fantasy. It was nothing more elegant than a teenage wet dream. The poem throws a new dynamic into this tumultuous mix.

She wonders if the fruit is ripe.

If this is finally the perfect time to take action.

Two children, both around nine years old, wave goodbye to their parents. They skip their down their driveway to where they'll wait for the school bus. On closer inspection, Maura realises that they're twins. They seem delightful as they hold hands and swing their lunchboxes.

Innocence.

The world holds ugly connotations for Maura, as if the very idea of innocence is a foul, ironic joke. Some devious delusion of satirical wit. Working as a coroner, and before that as an aid worker in war ravaged Africa, as long as she had, she has become frightfully disillusioned with the notion that the world is a safe place for innocence to live.

In the end, all innocence will become something lost.

She frowns. The breeze has picked up and the morning sun provides only a pale, watered down form of warmth. Pausing to set her briefcase down and slip on the coat she had been carrying, Maura longs to know when she became so cynical.

Not wishing to dwell on such depressing thoughts, Maura listens out for the bird calls which twinkle above her head with every tree she passes. She picks out the distinct sounds, identifying each of the birds that she hears.

But soon she can think only of the way, once again, she has a fascination with the idiom about killing two birds with one stone. When she thought of it yesterday in the morgue, it reminded her of Jane, and today it is no different.

Smiling like a girl doting on her high school crush, Maura reflects on the influence that Jane has had, and continues to have, on her life. She is happier.

She feels freer.

No longer alone in this world.

Last night, as she stood sweating and shaking under the blinding, boiling stage lights, she could have sworn that poem was written specifically about the two of them.

That day in the rain. When she had wanted so badly to wrap a hand around the back of Jane's neck and jerk her down into the most passionate kiss she had ever been prepared to give. As she pressed Jane to the Prius, as she felt the heated skin trapped beneath wet clothing...

But she didn't.

She respected the invisible boundaries erected from years of friendship.

Still, while the worlds of the poem revolve inside of her skull, Maura can't help but fantasise and hypothesise; _Could Jane sense that impulse from me that day? That need I had to have her? The urge I still have?_

Maura can't be sure. She isn't certain she wants to be.

The concept of Jane knowing the full extent of her feelings makes her head spin.

Something has got to give. This bucketlist run has been peppered with moments of the two women creeping closer to the line that lies between safe and something else entirely.

Leaving Beacon Hill and entering the sluggish morning gridlock which stretches right into the heart of the city, Maura is struck by gratitude, (to any deity willing to listen), that she didn't take her car today.

The congestion and the blaring of agitated horns is too much for her to deal with.

She crosses a few streets before letting her natural train of thought return to Jane. Her complex infatuation with the detective is tumbling out of control.

Because that is what this is.

An infatuation.

Hot and wild and horribly inappropriate. Touching on voyeuristic. But is isn't Maura's fault that her body wants her to straddle Jane's body and work her until her luxuriously made bed breaks. Maybe she'll get on all fours and...

No.

Have _Jane_ get on all fours while she...

Maura's head shakes in exasperation at herself. She shivers in self disgust as rolls of desire attempt to scupper her plans to have this be a day of cool, calm concentration. She has never experienced desire as crude and unwavering as this.

The crimson, amber and mucky brown leaves that flutter in the breeze and crunch under her graceful strides remind her of the changes in the seasons.

Such a dramatic shift from the vibrant, electric charge of a hot summer to the crisp, pre-winter air of fall. Yet no matter how many changes there are, how many difference seem to appear in the space of a mere few weeks, it is always perfect. Like the next part of the year is the next section of a dance; the tempo changes but the steps are all the same.

It makes Maura wonder if she needs to change something else in her own life. With the heat increasing in regards to how she feels about Jane, she is falling out of rhythm. This dance she performs is now at the stage where, to Maura, it is unrecognisable.

Rounding the avenue, she spots Jane on the steps of BPD with Korsak. The pair are laughing. They appear celebratory. Jane's beaming expression can be seen even from as far away as Maura is.

If it were possible that she accidentally took stimulant drugs with her breakfast earlier, Maura would believe it. Because all of a sudden every cell in her body is jumping.

The poem was the catalyst.

Someday, something's got to give. Shift. Change.

That day may just be today.

* * *

The first storm of the fall; the electric lightshow as summer meets the beginning of its demise.

It frightens Jo Friday, who cowers around Jane's ankles. The apartment is pitch dark, lit up in flashes of lightning. All power is out.

Jane and Maura are content to sit on the couch and stare straight out of the window. They listen to the howling wind and battering rain, and desperately long to know what the other is thinking. Because if Jane's apartment was anywhere near big enough, it would be evident that there is an elephant in the room.

They had come to Jane's apartment to hang out, watch some TV. Destress after the tough case this week had spat at their feet. But the storm came and the power was cut and here they are.

Visibility is all dull shadows and black shadows, dark grey filters with not much in between. Still, Jane catches a glimpse of Maura's profile every time the lightning strikes. It makes the roar of the storm outside seem like a glorious symphony. The soundtrack to her fantasies.

"Jane...?"

"Hmmm...?" Jane hums absently, and then sees Maura trying to get her attention. "Sorry, what?"

Maura smiles wanly. Jane grins wryly back. The detective bottles up too much, and Maura has experienced this many times before. Still she hopes Maura also understands that she must let Jane come to her gradually. If she feels pressured she'll pull away completely.

"I was asking if you could teach me something on the piano?" she asks.

Lightening invades the room in a burst, and Maura receives a snapshot of unease and distress before the curtain of darkness falls back down again. Jane's face feels twisted.

"Oh jeez. I haven't played since..."

 _Since Hoyt._

Maura regroups herself easily, so as not to alarm her friend. By her sour expression, Jane can tell she is cursing her ignorance.

"I'm sorry," Maura edges, hands fidgeting in her lap.

Jane doesn't reply, but ducks her head in response.

"Well I... Actually I have been practising something. You remember that learning a musical instrument is part of the criteria for my bucketlist?" she says, standing and smoothing down her skirt.

Thunder rattles the window frame. Jo Friday curls further around Jane's feet and whines. Her body quivers with terror at the ruckus of the storm outside. Absently, Jane reaches down to scratch behind her ears.

Jane's brow furrows as Maura pads her way over to the piano, usually hidden under paperwork. "What? Practising? When?"

Maura pulls out the piano bench, gracefully settling herself on it and giving a half shrug. "An hour here and there before or after work. And as for where, well I have an old acquaintance who used to handcraft pianos with his father. He has a workshop just outside of Chestnut Hill."

 _You never cease to fucking amaze me, Maura Isles._

Jane flexes her shoulders, eyes carefully keeping to Maura's hands which alight on the ivory keys. Though her eyes do wish to stray. To roam down the form fitting blue dress. The one that even in the pitch black darkness makes the wearer a total goddess.

There is rain splashing on the window pane and the sound of twin breathing.

And then a melody.

Jane doesn't recognise it, but it doesn't matter one bit. The twinkling high pitch tune and the smoother middle register chords warm her face like the ray of the morning sun. Even with the storm rambling outside of the window.

The sounds of Maura's unsure but precise finger patterns float around the room like the early spring breeze. Covering everything in a cloud of pleasantry and light.

Jane feels like her body is becoming lighter. Like this music is freeing her from so many bonds and chains that she never even realised she had. She takes a long breath in between the rumbling of thunder and Maura's fingers performing a perfect cadence.

She feels euphoria soaking through her skin and settling into her bones.

Like a spiritual experience.

And then it's over. The light goes away and the heaviness returns and there is thunder and rain and cold and darkness.

Maura turns around in her chair, nervousness scrawled across her face in the flash of lightning. "Was that okay?"

"Okay?" Jane chokes, rubbing her palms against her thighs. She doesn't know when her hands started shaking. Her scars are starting to ache with the chill and the weather. "Jeez, Maura, it was like the twilight zone in here."

Maura sniffs nonchalantly, looking away into the distance of the unlit apartment before refocusing on Jane. "I'll ignore the cultural reference which I'm sure I've completely misunderstood and ask you in layman's terms; was I any good?"

"Maura...how come you're so perfect at everything you do?" Jane blurts, the hands on her thighs digging their nails in. Damn, she did not mean to let that burst through.

"Jane, I'm hardly anywhere near perfect at everything," Maura dismisses. "In fact, it's statistically impossible to be-"

"Lemme play you something."

The words are out before she can stop them. She wants to grab them out from between them and cram them back inside of her again. Her scars are starting to ache. And she hasn't played the piano since her ordeal with Hoyt. Yet she would do anything for this woman.

Maura Isles is always the exception.

"Really?" Maura chirps, her already proper posture being bolstered up further as she practically bounces on the piano bench. "Oh Jane, you don't have to..."

Jane smiles, though she isn't sure Maura can see her features through the thicket of black shadows.

 _Of course I have to._

Heaving herself up off of the sofa, Jane disrupts Jo Friday, who yelps and scampers away. Jane will pet her and apologise later. Now she feels her feet moving of their own violation towards Maura on the bench. She doesn't fully understand the implications of what she wants to do.

"Shimmy forward there, Maur," Jane prompts.

Maura does what she's told. Throwing every shred of integrity and self control out of the window, Jane swings her legs on either side of Maura. The doctor's back is nestled tightly against her front. It takes every fibre of Jane's common sense to bite back a gasp.

Jane rests her chin on Maura's shoulder, ignoring the desire to nuzzle her nose into soft blonde curls. Or move them to the side so she can place her lips on Maura's slender neck. They are so close that they can feel each other breathing.

Jane slips her hands forward on either side of Maura's waist, and places her hands on the piano. "Ready?" she whispers.

Maura nods shyly. Jane hums, adjusting herself on the piano bench and clearing her throat. Possibly unconsciously, Maura pushes her hips slightly backwards into Jane's.

They don't utter a word about it but their minds are screaming at them.

Outside, the rain is the heaviest it has been all night. It batters the windows relentlessly.

"Okay," Jane says, her low voice making Maura sink back into her unintended embrace. They are undeniably comfortable with each other. Even when this level of intimacy should be too overwhelming for them.

Jane begins to play.

Maura, for the most part, seems to marvel at the movements of her hands. Jane is playing a melody she hasn't heard since she was in Vice. How she used to practise through the night, softly stroking the chords, to get her through the tough cases. And then Hoyt happened, and she was reduced to vaccuming.

Jane feels tentative hands at her elbows. A touch no more than a pressure, and then it is shyly retracted. A second time, and then palms are being slid up her tensing forearms. They come to rest on her hands. She continues to play, Maura's hands atop hers.

Their fingers fit perfectly together. Just like they do in every aspect of their lives together.

Jane is being hollowed out. Every dark place or bad memory or humiliating experience is being washed out from inside of her. She is drenched in a new passion.

And Maura is filtering it into her through this moment. This bond. This music.

With the rising of the storm outside and the crescendos in the music playing out in front of her, Jane finds a new clarity that she's never had before.

She will not let Maura leave this apartment tonight without kissing her.

If indeed she leaves at all with this storm. Jane is just sure that she will not lie awake one single night more. Not without knowing the taste and feel of the doctor's lips pressed against her own.

Jane closes her eyes and lets muscle memory do the work while she takes a backseat. The music lulls her away, and she is thinking about a time when she was a little less damaged, a little purer. She thinks of Hoyt, of Marino, of questions of morality and Maura.

 _God, Maura._

She thinks of all of the men and women who have come before her and shared a bed with the love of her life. She envies people she has never met, despises faces she wouldn't recognise on the street.

She wonders if she will ever divulge in their luxury. Their knowledge of how Maura arches from the bedsheets and clenches her eyes closed.

Does she gasp or groan with pleasure?

Does she moan so loud it reverberates in her chest or does she scream when she comes?

These lovers have tasted her in places that make Jane break out in a hot, sticky sweat. They have felt with their fingertips every curved rib, lock of damp, sweat-slicked hair and ridge of vertebrae that Maura has to give them.

And still the music plays on.

And when it ends, it dies away into the air which settles around them. They're both so still, and still so close.

Thunder rattles the windows and Jane thinks the glass will blow inwards. Shatter on the floor. But it doesn't.

Clearing her throat and moving away from the body she craves, Jane stands awkwardly and brushes her hands down her front. Maura doesn't turn to face her, but shifts to the left, leaving the invitation open.

Jane, against her internal warnings and common sense, takes it, sitting beside Maura this time.

The air feels thick. Maybe it's the static caused by the raging storm outside. But it also feels familiar.

It reminds her of when she was a teenager anticipating her first kiss. She wonders if she forgot about doing a line of cocaine in the bathroom. Every inch of her skin is prickling with anxiety but her head is spinning with delirious joy.

Here is this woman that she is in love with, sitting right here. So close that their elbows brush. Their thighs pressed together. Jane can feel Maura breathe.

And as for Maura, she plays with hem of her skirt. Jane is glad; it helps her to avoid putting her hands on either side of Maura's face and pulling their lips together.

The lack of talking between them is becoming frightfully awkward, something that it has never been. It scares Jane so, that her attraction could go so unnoticed by Maura and yet cause such a rift.

Yet that is the problem. It is not unnoticed anymore, at least it shouldn't be.

The poem is the most obvious thing that Jane could have thought og.

Maura appears to wiggles her shoulders slightly. And then her voice, timid and quiet, fits in the charged space between each thunder roll;

"You think I'm making this up because I'm invited to dinner and have to be nice," she says, talking more to the hem of her skirt than Jane.

After a moment's hesitancy, Jane's head turns towards her. "What?"

Maura raises her head, a strange, sad smile on her face. As if she's looking at a picture of a lost relative. "Oh, I could do that! I could put on an act for you, Laura, and say lots of things without being very sincere. But this time I am. I'm talking to you sincerely."

Jane's eyes widen as another round of thunder makes her whole apartment building creak and shudder. The rain batters a little harder. She sees the way Maura has sunken into her own world, and starts to panic, thinking that the doctor has somehow completely lost her sanity in the space of thirty seconds.

But then, after wracking her brain, she reminds the bucket lists. _Wasn't there something about...?_

"I happened to notice you had this inferiority complex that keeps you from feeling comfortable with people," Maura explains, waving her hand in the air. "Somebody needs to build your confidence up and make you proud instead of shy and turning away and – blushing. Somebody -ought to-"

Her breath catches in her throat, and she turns her face, finally, to face Jane. Her voice is so tiny and shy, Jane strains to hear her over the rain lashing against the window, despite being right beside her. "Ought to - kiss you, Jane."

The name slips past. Jane knows that isn't in the original monologue but damn if it isn't the sweetest thing she's ever heard. Maura says her name like it's honey melting in her mouth on a bright spring morning.

No thunder clouds here.

"You learned your monologue," Jane appraises, but in a husky tone which has nothing to do with the monologue itself and all to do with the subtext.

A flash of lightning lights the air between them. It shows just how dark Maura's eyes have grown. And then darkness once more.

"I did," comes the reply.

Jane swallows. "Cool. I mean, that's impressive. So...uh..."

Jo Friday timidly whimpers form under the coffee table as another burst of thunder makes everything in Jane's apartment quake. Jane thinks she blinks a few times, but she is vaguely aware that she stopped speaking in the middle of a sentence and now there aren't any more words coming to her.

But Maura Isles has had enough. "Oh for heaven's sake, Jane. I'm tired of this charade."

And Maura lunges forward, pressing her lips to Jane's.

They move together, kissing haphazardly for a moment; Jane realising what was happening too late and Maura realising what she had just _done_ too late. They ease back, eyes wide and unfocused.

It was unplanned, imperfect, uncoordinated.

It may have been the best damn kiss Jane Rizzoli has ever had.

The lightning crashes outside. Jo whimpers and huddles down deeper under the coffee table.

"Maura..." A gasp.

"Shhh, don't speak." Maura's voice trembles, denial and shock at her own off the cuff action.

"Maura-"

"Jane, I'm sorry, I don't know what I-"

And lips are on hers again. Softer this time, but also confident. The kiss reassures with _I want this_.

It asks _why now?_

But it murmurs _I think I fucking love you._

Whenever the haze of kissing the woman she's in love with clears for a second, Jane feels the softness of Maura's cheek under one of her palms, and the bite of the wooden piano stool under the other from where she leans her weight. She pulls back.

Something inside of both of them kicks in; something that makes them both think that they're dreaming.

Jane thinks about the stars, about what Maura told her once. How some of them are already dead and some of them aren't. It takes so long for their light to travel to earth, she remembers, that at any given time when we crane back our necks and glare up at the sparkling darkness, we could just be looking at ruptured galaxies and dead stars.

It is a semblance.

 _Is this a semblance too? Is this real or is this something we believe to be real because we have only the theory in our head to proof it, and no evidence?_

"Jane, what is this?" Fear.

Jane licks her lips. She can _taste_ her. She can't tear her eyes away from where she thinks Maura's are in the dark.

"Maura Isles," she whispers, shaking her head in wonder as if that could answer Maura's question. "Maura Isles. Maura Isles. Dr. Maura Dorthea Isles."

Maura shifts on the piano stool to face Jane more. She does it carefully, afraid to break the boundaries of their dream. Almost like if she moves too fast or doesn't answer quick enough, she'll wake up alone in her bed again. Jane understands.

"Jane-"

"Maura Isles," Jane laughs.

It is the kind of sound that only occurs when Jane is elated. When she's cracked a terrible case, or her sports teams have won an impossible match, or Maura has said something that gifts her voice a rich, delighted tone.

It makes the dark room swirl with colour for a moment.

 _Perhaps I've lost my mind,_ she considers.

"Maura Isles," Jane whispers, her voice lower as she blindly reaches for Maura's hand in the dark. After two unsuccessful gropes, she catches a wrist, and hold onto it like a lifeline in the storm.

The thunder sounds like a nuclear bomb blasting just outside in the miserable Boston street.

And words come pouring forth at last.

"I've fallen in love with out so _disastrously_ hard that sometimes, when I'm with you, I can't tell what's up or down, or left or right or anything. Who or what's around me just kinda melts away, until it's just the two of us," Jane admits.

There is something about feeling a pulse underneath her fingertips that makes her mouth speak the truth and all filters nonexistent.

Maura sits in silence, her face obscured by shadow.

Jo Friday whines the coffee table.

 _Say something_ , Jane's mind screams. _Please, I'm desperate. God Dammit, say something please, Maura, please. Fuck I love you._

"Jane," Maura utters, "Loss of space and depth awareness as well as higher cognitive functions are very dangerous.

Jane splutters and coughs, hacking out her surprise as once again, Maura manages to yank the rug from beneath her feet. "It makes me feels so dizzy when my heart squeezes so damn hard in my chest."

There isn't anything stopping this flood gates have opened and now Jane Rizzoli is taking a plunge in the deepest waters imaginable.

"But I wouldn't have it any other way, Maura."

Jane's minds flashes with a warm, bright, sepia image; the day she got the dogtags. The ones which hang in her car. First chance she gets, she'll give them to Maura. She can wear them and remember forever that she captured Jane Rizzoli's heart.

Because the dogtags belong to someone worthy.

Who is more worthy than Maura Isles?

A car honks outside, and there's a screech of tires, and then it too becomes lost in the never ending downpour. Jane wonders if she'll ever see the sun again.

Of course not; all of the sun is right here in this apartment. She can't see Maura's face very well, she can't make much out except basic shapes and the occasional fleeting detail, but this is the warmest, brightest interaction Jane's ever lived through and she never wants it to end.

"Jane?" Maura manages, her voice thick. Jane's heart thumps with the desire to kiss her again.

"Uh huh?" If Maura didn't know any better, she'd think Jane sounded drunk.

But when you profess your love for someone after it being pent up for so long, the relief can be downright euphoric.

"I've fallen in love with you too," Maura murmurs, leaning forward to brush her lips against the detective's. Her words tickle sensitive skin. "Perhaps we can share these symptoms of dizziness, confusion and lust together?"

The hand around Maura's wrist squeezes in the darkness.

 _Downright euphoric._


	13. This Sensation Is Overwhelming

_If you're wondering what song is used here by Maura, it's either Lurk or ICan'tEven, both by The Neighbourhood. Or, I suppose, any song you wish it to be. Hope you enjoy!_

* * *

 _Click!_

Maura swiftly chops the tomato in half. She moves it to the edge of the chopping board before moving onto another one. She is quick, efficient, and well versed in this skill. One she is fond of in her own kitchen and one which she uses every day in her job.

Yet tonight her hands are trembling and her cutting is sloppier than her usual standard. This is disappointing. But she doesn't register the thought because anxiety is rattling her bones.

 _Click!_

Behind her, Angela Rizzoli is humming softly under her breath. The matriarch swishes lettuce and cucumber underneath the cold water tap. Cradling the bowl and rocking it as if it were a child. Most days, though her presence irritates Jane, it soothes Maura. Her affection and aura gives Maura the opportunity to experience a maternal nature that she wasn't subjected to as a child.

But now, it is stifling. Too much, like pressure building inside her skull threatening to melt her brain and let it dribble out of her ears. How can someone just being there cause a migraine?

 _Click!_

 _This must be what Jane feels,_ she thinks with chagrin.

"So, you guys closed the case. Boy, aren't you relieved?" Angela says.

Maura doesn't turn, keeping her back to the matriarch. This way, Angela can't see the sickly, anxious pallor that she knows her skin has taken.

"Yes," she croaks, her voice tight.

"Mmm..." Angela hums.

Maura's shoulders are held so high they almost touch her ears. For someone usually so relaxed and calm, this is a strange sight. If Angela happens to pick up on this one detail, she will sense that obviously there is something very wrong.

Especially if yoga can't fix it.

And Angela Rizzoli, master in the art of whittling information out of people, will set to work.

"I'm glad. At least Jane can rest easier," Angela states. She chuckles warmly at the irony, and Maura smiles; as if Jane Rizzoli would ever rest easily.

Maura finishes her task, scraping the chopped tomatoes from the chopping board into a pan. She closes her eyes at the satisfying sizzle.

If she could release her emotional burdens as easy as the steam wafting up steadily from a pan, perhaps this nightmare called life could be even the slightest bit more manageable.

Angela turns off the tap, wringing her hands over the basin and reaching for a dish cloth. Maura sees her out of the corner of her eyes. Angela takes her time, appraising her options, as well as the woman skirting her way around the living room.

"Jane is still down interrogating their suspect, isn't she?" Angela asks. She sets up her traps as carefully as an experienced poacher.

Maura has to be so, so cautious.

"Well, no. She has already secured a confession. I'm sure now she is simply finishing her mandatory paperwork in order to fully close the case," Maura replies, her fingertips tapping at the outside of her thighs.

She is restless with all of this spiky energy inside of her. She straightens out the couch cushions for the sake of having something to do.

Angela notices. Maura knows she notices. She neatly folds the dish cloth and places it on the counter. She faces Maura, who is shuffling her feet in the living room. The doctor, even in her own home, seems at a loss of what to do. Her eyes trace the walls and furniture as if she is seeing it for the first time.

"So she is still down at that station?"

"Yes," Maura nods her affirmation quickly, then curses her eagerness. "Well, she texted me about eight minutes ago saying that she would be home within the hour."

Angela's mouth quirks at the edges. As if to say _interesting._

Maura is caught before she can even begin to flee. For every time she mentions Jane, she experiences a whole body twitch. She runs her fingertips over the edge of the couch and imagines what is going through angela's mind.

 _So it has to do with my daughter._ Angela smoothes her palms onto the island top. _Well they aren't fighting. She perhaps a man is involved..._

"Maura, have you noticed how Jane has been... oh, I don't know," she breathes, shaking her head in false hopelessness. Maura's eyes widen. _Bingo_.

"Has been what, Angela?" Maura asks hoarsely, her hands now dancing around her waist.

"Oh, I'm being silly, don't mind me," Angela dismisses, but Maura's eyes are pleading. She lowers her voice, beckoning Maura closer through the pull of secrecy alone. Timidly, like a young lamb without its mother, Maura approaches the island.

Because knowing that Angela has already picked up on the dynamic change, it is only a matter of time before she badgers it out of Jane or herself. So what choice does she have?

"It's as if she has a new man on the go," Angela explains, "More dreamy. A bounce in her step. A little more effort with her appearance. You know, the small things."

Maura's whole body stiffens. A green light appears in Angela's eyes.

"Well I...I'm not," Maura tries.

"Oh, honey. It's okay. Jane will tell me in her own time," Angela saves. But Maura can tell she is only biding her time as she leans her elbows on the counter.

Maura breaks out in a slick, cold sweat. Ice cubes have somehow found their way into her digestive system. Making her tremble with the impossible chill.

"It's just you, well, don't seem at all yourself today, Maura. Is it because you aren't sure of him?"

Maura's hands flex in and out of fists at her sides. "Jane...well..."

 _Jane's mine._

"Jane's choice of men has never been perfect, you and I know that," Angela jokes, "But tell me, is he handsome? Tall?"

"He..."

"I'll bet he's tall. My daughter is a tall girl. She needs a tall man!"

Maura attempts to stall. "I don't think Jane would appreciate-"

"Jane doesn't have to hear a thing!"

Maura fidgets. The desire to declare the truth is rising inside of her, becoming harder every second for her to hold it in. Her ribs creak with the stain of containing her unconditional emotion for Jane.

"What's his profession?" Please tell me he isn't anything to do with law enforcement," Angela laments.

"No...not exactly," Maura segues, glancing up at the clock.

 _Jane please come home._

"Is he a lawyer? A businessman? No! Oh, Maura, please tell me he's a doctor."

"Yes," Maura admits, wringing her hands.

 _Shoot._

Angela's eyes explode into sparkles of pride and pleasure. "He is? Finally! A doctor in the Rizzoli family. What's his name?"

Maura opens her mouth, and only a petrified squeak comes out.

Angela narrows her eyes suspiciously. "Maura?"

"It- I- I can't, Angela, I'm sorry."

"C'mon, Maura. There's no harm in telling me! I am Jane's mother after all."

"Angela, please..."

"I mean, heaven knows I'd be lucky if she tells me if she ever gets married!"

"Angela, I told you, I'm not-"

"And he's probably gorgeous. I don't know why she gets so embarrassed-"

"It's me!" Maura barks, her hands flying up to her face as she immediately senses the blow of Angela's silent shock.

 _Oh God._

The kitchen falls into dead stillness. The tomatoes continue to merrily sizzle in the pan, unfazed. After a heartbeat or two, a car drives past, getting louder and then quieter until it too disappears into the stillness.

Maura can barely breathe; it would be too loud. Her lungs have deflated until they are empty sacks and now she can't get them to work again. Her chest burns from the inside. She drops her hands, letting them smooth down non-existent wrinkles on her dress. Her eyes dash around the tiled floor, unable to meet Angela's gaze.

If one of them doesn't speak soon, Maura may pass out.

"Are you in love with her?" Angela asks softly.

Maura's eyes flick upwards. She blinks. This was a play she didn't see coming. She nods sharply. "Very much so."

Angela processes this, her eyes leaving Maura and walking leisurely over every kitchen surface, idly searching for something. She inhales a long breath before speaking again. "Are you two together?"

Her voice sounds alien. Like it doesn't belong to Angela Rizzoli at all but some other, foreign being.

"I-I'm not sure," Maura says, lowering her gaze again. "We haven't really spoken about what we both want." She doesn't find the answer adequate, and struggles to express herself further. "We've...acknowledged that there is something between us and- and I've kissed her, But neither of us have really pushed it anymore than that."

Maura recalls last night, how they had stretched out along Jane's couch. She could feel the weight of Jane's body against hers even now. But it went no further, because at the slightest chance it was, Jane would duck away and shyly pull back.

Angela seems to understand, nodding slowly.

The fact that she hasn't stormed out. Or stabbed Maura in the stomach. Or broken down in a pitiful, bitter disappointment at the fact her daughter hasn't found love with a strong man lets Maura relax, if only slightly.

Angela rubs her palms together and laughs nervously. "I can't lie to you, Maura. This news doesn't surprise me as much as maybe it should," she says. She makes her way around to the living room couch and gestures for Maura to do the same.

Considering the bombshell she just dropped, Maura doesn't think she has a choice to refuse.

They sit together, perched at opposite ends with a definite expanse of space between them.

"And, well, you aren't the worst choice for Jane. In fact, if you two work it out, I might even be relieved." More nervous laughter.

It is quiet for a moment, the awkwardness wrapping around their throats and choking conversation out of them. Another car passes. High notes of children's laughter penetrate the room around them, filtering in from the street through the open window, warming them in the way that the innocence mirth of children often does.

"You care for her. You understand her a lot more than I do," Angela breathes, smiling wanly. Maura replies with a half-smile of her own.

Angela shifts a little closer to Maura on the couch, her face serious but with no trace of anger. "If you want some advice, Maura, Jane needs a little help realizing what she could have if she got her backside in gear."

Maura sees the humour glowing behind the eyes and voice, and Angela waits for the meaning to hit Maura.

The doctor jolts. "You mean seduce her?" she chirps.

Angela shrugs one of her shoulders, reaching out to take Maura's hand. "All I'm saying is that most of the time, if you want something from people, you need to put it to them straight," Angela explains bluntly. "It doesn't have to be a big gesture. Just make everything clear. Go to her, don't wait for her to come to you."

 _So, seduce your daughter?_ Maura mentally summarizes.

"Let your intentions be known and, well," Angela shrugs, She winks and squeezes Maura's hand. "You're a good girl, Maura. And I'm proud of you just like I'm proud of Jane."

She pats Maura's hand and then gets up to go and check the tomatoes which have been hissing in the pan the entire time.

Maura is dumbstruck. But she can't help but feel like that was Angela's way of expressing her approval for Maura as a suitor for Jane.

Now, all she needs to do is figure out what approach to take with Jane.

 _Would answering the door in the nude be too much?_

She twists her ring in thought, fretting about whether or not she should be so forward. She thinks about how it all began, with dinner and a discussion about a bucketlist.

 _What does Jane have left on hers?_

 _What do I have left on mine?_

And Maura remembers.

And she grins devilishly, because she has a plan.

* * *

Jane is in a suspended state of confusion and arousal.

Maura's dining room smells of the spicy meal that had been waiting for her when she got home from finishing up their case. Glasses were pregnant with red wine. Candles made shadows flicker and dance on the wall.

Maura's cool-cotton scented perfume lingers on every surface, filling the room. The smell of fresh shirts swaying in the spring breeze. Yet this is juxtaposed with passion hidden in heat and the mystery of shadow.

Jane can't help but think this is a seduction.

She's never technically been seduced before, nor has she been the seductress, so she has no reference point from which to compare. But of course, she has sat through enough terrible, cheesy romantic films and TV shows to know roughly what one would be like.

Then, a growling bass throbs around her, engulfing her in a vibrating embrace. It comes from the door leading in to the living room. The air seems to tremble around her with the slow pulse of the music.

"Maura?" Jane calls hesitantly, craning her head. Since they finished their meal, Jane had been instructed not to move anywhere while Maura cleared away the plates.

Initially, Jane wanted to protest, but when the word _surprise_ slipped from the doctor's lips, suddenly very little in the world could move the brunette.

"In here," the response floats in.

On her first attempt to stand, her knees buckle and she slumps straight back down into her chair. Unbuttoning the cuffs of her shirt, she rolls up her sleeves. She watches her forearm muscles flex under tanned skin, darker in the shadow, if only to try and pass her nerves.

Standing steadily this time, Jane pushes her chair in, unable to do much more than break out in a nervous sweat. She tries to calm down. Maura made her dinner, it isn't an uncommon occurrence.

Now they are most likely going to recline on the sofa together. Relax, perhaps with wine glasses refilled, and congratulate each other on closing another case.

So why is her tongue lying so thick in her mouth?

"Jane?" The name curls around her like smoke blown into her face. Her legs threaten to crumple beneath her.

Yet her feet move to obey the hidden command.

Just like the dining room had been, the living room is a shimmering chasm of shadows flitting to the movement of strategically placed candles.

The music makes the room shiver in anticipation from where it seeps into the air from the stereo in the corner of the room. The stereo remote sits on the coffee table along with a note –

 _Sit._

Jane feels the tickling in her throat which would make her want to swallow but her mouth is sticky. Like any words would find it hard to leave her and reach the air. Feeling like a pure lamb being led straight to the door of the slaughterhouse, Jane perches timidly in the middle of the couch.

She strains her eyes through the glare of the candle light, squinting out around the black darkness around the room. "Maura?"

The two hands which appear on the top of her head from behind make her jump in surprise, but the low, breathy chuckle makes her relax. She doesn't turn. She trusts Maura.

Even when her heart is pumping harder than is healthy.

Fingertips start to rub in tiny circular patterns. Jolts of pleasure shoot down Jane's spine and her eyes close of their own accord.

"Relax," Maura whispers, and Jane obeys. She sinks back into the couch. She imagines that she melts under Maura's touch, rendering her as helpless.

Maura brushes her fingertips over Jane's scalp and temples. Massaging away the stress lines and the exhaustion which plagues her bones. And yet no matter how lethargic she had been feeling as a result of this case, now Jane's body feels like it is humming.

Like Maura's hands are siphoning electrical current through her. Putting her mind to sleep and awakening her primal impulses.

Jane's lips part in a soft groan. "Is this a seduction?" she murmurs.

Maura laughs breathily, leaning down to kiss Jane's temple. "Good work, detective," she husks, pulling Jane's earlobe into her mouth and tugging with her teeth.

Jane swallows audibly. At her sides, her hands start to tremble, the dangerous cocktail of arousal and nerves making the blood jump in her veins.

Maura takes a deep breath, ghosting her lips over the sensitive shell of Jane's ear. The woman on the sofa shivers. Maura smiles against Jane's ear. Her hands leave Jane, and she rounds the couch. Jane opens her eyes, and immediately they light up.

Jane lets her eyes roam down Maura's barely clad body, which wears only a black, flowing silk rope and lacy black underwear. Maura bites her bottom lip, putting her hands on her hips as she allows Jane to gawk at her. Then she grins impishly, slipping the robe from her shoulders and letting it pool at her feet with a shimmy of her shoulders.

"Jesus, Maura..." Jane drawls appreciatively.

Maura, dressed unabashedly in only her underwear, presses a finger to her lips. "Shh, no talking."

Maura straddles Jane's lap, feeling confident that the brunette admired her body. Jane's hips tilt forward of their own accord, even when she feels like her heart is thumping inside of her throat. She nearly asks Maura to check her glands, make sure everything is working okay.

Maura leans down in a fluid motion, pressing her lips to Jane's, kissing her chastely. She licks her lips, savouring the flavour with a devilish smile.

"On your bucketlist, you listed a lapdance," Maura whispers, the breath tickling Jane's lips. She sucks on an angled jaw, which dips to the side to allow her more access. Jane's breathing has gets shallower.

"Here's your lapdance, detective."

Jane squirms. She nips hard at her lip to stifle the moan that bubbles inside her at the feeling of Maura's body pressed deliciously against her own. Maura undulates her hips to the beat of the music, lazily draping her arms over Jane's shoulders. Maura's eyes are black. They come so close so that their foreheads are touching.

Jane watches through hooded eyelids as Maura pulls back. She pushes her chest out and lets her head fall backwards. Her hair cascades down her back, glowing golden in the candlelight. Jane faintly wonders, in between twitching to lave her tongue over the teasing lacy material of the black bra in front of her face, what wonderful deed she did to deserve this little piece of heaven.

Maura rises up again, her shoulders and hips grinding to the beat as she bends forward and flicks her tongue out, grazing Jane's top lip. Then she once again places fleeting, open mouthed kisses along the clenching jaw. Jane's cognitive abilities slow to a trickle.

She is just this bass, this woman, this room, all feeling.

The blonde draws in a long breath, absorbing the spice of Jane's body lotion, before sucking on Jane's pulse point. This time Jane can't help but moan out, fisting her hands on the edge of the couch, knowing Maura wasn't anywhere near done with her.

Maura continues to grind down on Jane's lap. Both of them now have laboured breathing. The beginning of a sheen of sweat glistens on Jane's forehead and bare forearms in the candlelight. She didn't know whether this was an illusion or fantasy or reality. The erotic pulse of the music started to match the pulse in her ears and temples and between her legs but that could also be fantasy.

As the song transitions into a new one, Maura leans back. She trails her finger tips up the ridges of Jane's throat, tilting her head backwards onto the top of the sofa by the chin. Jane's eyes close as she allows Maura complete control of her.

"Well, did my seduction work?" She imagines Maura's eyes are dazzling with delight at reducing Jane to putty in her hands.

Jane's eyes flutter open. She consciously registers a smug, lilting question. But she also realises it may take a while for the blood to circulate back to her brain from the almost painful throbbing between her legs.

Maura doesn't wait for a reply. She just leans back in to brush her lips repeatedly over Jane's column of skin. Jane shakes under her with nervous and excitement and every insecurity that she could possibly have.

What if she isn't good enough for Maura? She's never been with another woman before. What if she lets her down? Waters her expectations into some awkward encounter that neither of them will quite want to remember.

"Maura... shouldn't we, uh... _shit_ ," she hisses, her eyes falling shut as Maura flicks her tongue out over the scarred flesh below her jaw. A reminder of Hoyt's psychotic wrath.

"You want to stop?" Maura purrs, her voice hoarse like pure temptation. Breathy and hinting at the wild nature crackling under the surface.

But when Jane doesn't answer, she sobers up, pulling back and taking Jane's face in her hands.

Maura repeats her question, this time in a serious voice. One which tells Jane she isn't going to face any judgement if she were to announce that she wasn't ready for them to jump straight into bed together. Her eyes search Jane's for any trace of doubt of reluctance, unwilling to pressurise her companion into anything that she is not one hundred percent comfortable with.

Jane feels transparent under Maura's gaze. No matter how tender and loving it may be, Her insecurities hiss in her ears almost as loudly as the banging of her heart.

"I just-shit- I've never been with another woman, and I don't wanna be a let down for you if I screw it up or do something wrong or..."

Maura laughs. Light and airy and while the sound makes Jane delirious, the doctor's hands massage gently at her scalp. Her vision dimming somewhat, Jane gets the impression that she is watching them from a far.

Detached. Feeling but not quite being. Like a daydream.

"Jane," Maura whispers, leaning in to press her lips against the woman's cheek and then nudge the tip of her nose against Jane's. Jane's mind is full of desire and fear and dizzying emotions.

But Maura reassures through cautious touches and drains them all away, leaving her languid and numb.

Her body is so relaxed, that if Maura got off of her lap right now, she might slide right off the couch into a puddle on the floor.

"Amazing," Jane utters, capturing Maura's lips. The power of a single word from Maura is magical.

And what is even more magical is that the single word is her name.

* * *

Maura smiles into the kiss.

She hates to think of it as a victory, because she hates to think of Jane as a conquest. But the coiling in her abdomen and the roar of anticipation in her ears tell her otherwise.

Carefully, Maura climbs from Jane's lap and stands. Firstly, she uses the remote to silence the stereo. Quiet smothers the room. Jane looks afraid to even breathe.

Then, almost in a practised routine, Maura blows out each of the candles. She disappears into the dining room, repeating the act. Jane remains on the sofa, her company a handful of spared candles.

Maura returns, extinguishing the candles with loner pauses, until there is a single candle left. She meets Jane's eyes as she dips and blows it out, plunging them into darkness.

Then she comes to stand in front of Jane. She offers out her palms; an invitation without any pressure. Though it is dark, Jane's eyes remain locked with Maura's as she hesitates, but then sets her hands into Maura's. Trust radiates from the action. Maura is elated.

She tugs Jane up to stand, flattening Jane's hands against her waist. Jane's breath hitches in her throat at the feeling of Maura's warm skin.

"Do you love me?" Maura asks, her voice reverberating around Jane's head. She reaches up and places her hands on either side of Jane's face, drawing her down so that their lips are close but not quite touching.

"I do," Jane confirms, a subtle jerk of the head to reinforce her feeling. "So much. Do you? Love me, I mean?"

 _She is so terribly nervous thinking that she is going to embarrass herself. I can feel how she shakes like a lamb under my hands. This is no good._

Maura steps back, out of Jane's embrace. She laces her fingers with one of Jane's hands, leading her wordlessly to the bedroom. Their journey is quiet, and tense. The anticipation fogs around the halls they tread through. Once inside, Maura pushes Jane up against the door, surprising her with her show of aggression.

Maura kisses Jane with a passion that surprises both of them. It says everything about her wants. She wants Jane and she communicates it with a nip to her bottom lip, soothing it by sucking it tenderly. Jane groans.

"Maura..."

"Shh my love. Relax," Maura purrs. She fists her hands in Jane's shirt, tugging it up and out of her pants. She kisses Jane again, tasting the warm wetness of her mouth. She begins to unbutton Jane's shirt. Each button is a question. A reassurance. It's paced; giving Jane the opportunity to stop her each time.

But Jane's hands simply fall timidly to Maura's waist again, squeezing the curves at her hips. It makes Maura smile against her lips.

Maura kisses along Jane's jaw line. "You can touch me you know, if you'd like."

Jane shivers. Her hands drift up Maura's bare back. Her fingers flex against the expanse of bare skin. It makes Maura shiver as she drifts her hands up to Jane's shoulders, tugging off her shirt and letting it fall to the floor.

It's dark in the bedroom, just light enough to see each other's silhouettes. As Maura runs her flattened palms down Jane's twitching abs to grasp at her belt buckle, she pauses in thought.

"Would you like a light on? A few candle lit up? Some music, perhaps?" she inquires, leaning in to brush her lips against Jane's prominent collarbones.

"Uh," Jane rasps. Maura kisses her throat just as she swallows. "No, I-I don't think so."

"Okay. I thought you might be more at ease if there was more of an atmosphere."

"I don't need more of an atmosphere, Maura. I've got you, don't I?"

Jane's hands sweep down to her lower back and pull her closer. The bare skin of their stomachs brush, causing warmth to spiral through Maura and settle in her lower belly.

"Okay," she whispers, slipping her arms around Jane.

She creeps them up her spine, gently pressing her fingertips and feeling out each of the vertebrae there. She murmurs latin terms against Jane's skin, running through the bones in her head. Running through the terms for the chemicals filling their blood streams as they shuffle towards the edge of the bed. Jane relaxes with the words. Her hands run through Maura's hair. Lips touch her temple. Her cheek. Her jaw. Her neck.

Maura grins. _Yes._

Jane perches on the edge of the bed as Maura gets Jane's bra clasp undone. She kisses the top of Jane's shoulder as she lets the straps fall and then discards the bra at their feet.

"Move up a bit, sweetheart," Maura encourages, crawling over Jane as she does so.

The amount of trust and tenderness radiating off of Jane threatens to undermine Maura. The passion roars inside but she remains committed to creating a safe, gentle experience for Jane. She travels her lips down over Jane's breasts. She takes one straining nipple into her mouth and reaches for Jane's belt buckle again at the same time.

The mewling sound she draws from Jane as she flickers the tip of her tongue around her nipple is something which she is sure she'd love to get used to on a regular basis.

She unbuckles Jane's pants, and then grips the waistband. She peeks up through her eyelashes, silently asking for permission to go further. Jane is looking at her through heavily lidded eyes. She nods her head. Eagerly, Maura notes with a smirk.

Obediently, Maura pulls off Jane's pants and sets them on the floor before sliding her hands up the inside of Jane's thighs. With the pads of her thumbs, she brushes back and forth on the sensitive areas near Jane's centre.

"You didn't answer my question. About whether or not you love me," Jane says shakily, her eyes closing and her head dropping backwards as Maura leans down to plant kisses and bites around her navel.

Maura chuckles softly against her skin, making the tight muscles jump under her lips. "I'm going to show you instead. I hope I won't even have to tell you after I'm done because, well..." Her lips drift over Jane's sharp hipbone as she teasingly pulls down the elastic of her underwear. "...you'll just know."

And then Jane's underwear is with the rest of her clothes on the floor of Maura's bedroom.

Maura looks down at the woman she will soon know as her lover. Jane's forearms are straining to ground her as she trembles with, presumably, nerves.

It is then that she is struck by the thought that Jane has never been this vulnerable with any lover before. Has always been rough and tumble with men who match her strength and stamina. Has never taken the time to savour every taste, every smell, every gasp. She whimpers when Maura places her hands on her knees and spreads her legs apart slowly.

"Are you sure that you want this? we can stop at any time." Maura keeps her eyes on her Jane's face as she whispers the words. Jane's bottom lip is now caught between her teeth. She nods jerkily.

Maura licks her lips, dragging her nails up the inside of the detective's thighs. Presses the pads of both of her thumbs through Jane's wetness.

"Shit, Maura," Jane hisses, her hips jerking at the teasing touches. "Shit...I dunno if...guys haven't really been able...dunno if I-"

"Shh, lover. Relax, I'll take care of you."

As soon as Maura's mouth covers her aching core, Jane is whimpering. She moans and bends her body to Maura's will. Maura circles the tip of her tongue around Jane's clit. The blonde glances up and sees, in a patch of moonlight, the sheen of Jane's forehead and between her breasts. Sees long, bony hands clawing into the silk sheets in the shadows.

And suddenly Maura is merciless. Filled with an urge to get her lover off as hard as possible. To forget anyone who has ever come before her. Erase them from the very fabric of memory. She assaults Jane's pulsing clit with as much vigour as she can muster. Jane cries out, her hand clenching tightly in Maura's hair. Maura doesn't care, she just holds Jane's undulating hips down with one hand. She slips her tongue down and inside Jane, covering her clit with the pad of her thumb.

"Oh Maura, oh, J-jesus," Jane murmurs, chest heaving now.

Her breaths come in pants Maura's fingers push into her. Maura's tongue returns to relieve the aching throb of her clit. Jane's hips buck as her whole body tenses with each thrust of those relentless fingers inside of her. Her head thrashes to and fro, growing closer to the edge.

By now, Maura notes smugly, Jane is practically incoherent, breathing interspersed only with her name.

"Come for me, Jane," Maura whispers against her.

And like magic, Jane arches back, calling out for Maura again and again, grasping for her with desperate hands. But Maura never stops. Jane's head falls back onto the sheets and her back bows off of the bed.

With a final wild cry of Maura's name, Jane falls into oblivion.


End file.
